#39: Thinking Fourth-Dimensionally

Thinking Fourth-Dimensionally

A Lecture in the Voice & Spirit of Neville Goddard

Man lives bound by the three dimensions of length, width, and height, and he feels the weight of that limitation in every unfulfilled desire, in every circumstance that seems fixed and immovable. Yet I tell you, the secret of freedom is hidden within a greater dimension, the fourth dimension of time itself, and when you learn to think fourth-dimensionally you step out of the shadow-world of appearances into the living reality where all things are possible here and now.

Think fourth-dimensionally and you discover that the solid world you touch and see is but a cross-section of a far vaster reality. Every object you perceive, every event that unfolds before your eyes, is no more than a momentary slice cut through a four-dimensional whole. Time is the fourth dimension, the medium in which change occurs, the measure that gives life and movement to what would otherwise remain static and lifeless. A straight line acquires shape and substance by the addition of a second dimension; a surface becomes a solid by the third; and the solid itself, when viewed through the fourth dimension of time, reveals itself as but a fleeting cross-section of a greater, more substantial body that endures and changes across the whole span of its existence.

You meet another person and believe you are meeting a complete being, yet in truth you are encountering only one thin slice of that four-dimensional self, the particular moment now present to your senses. The full self of that person stretches from birth to death and beyond, all its moments coexisting in the fourth dimension. To think fourth-dimensionally is to see not the isolated cross-section but the entire array of experiences as a present whole, animated, living, and subject to your creative direction. Change is the very nature of this dimension, and therefore you, by entering it consciously, become the master of change.

The three-dimensional world you now inhabit is real enough to the senses, yet it is a shadow cast by a more fundamental and dimensionally larger world. It is an abstraction drawn from a deeper reality, and that deeper reality is itself an abstraction from one still more profound, extending without end. But you need concern yourself only with two worlds in this infinite series: the world known through your bodily organs, the world of length, width, and height, and the world perceived independently of those organs through the focused power of your imagination. To alter conditions in the first you must first enter the second and reorder them there.

Observe how naturally this works. You desire a change in your life. Instead of wrestling with the outward facts as they appear, you withdraw your attention from the evidence of the senses and turn inward. You construct in your imagination the precise event that would imply the fulfillment of your desire. You do not merely think about it; you enter it. You feel yourself actually participating in that scene, here and now, with all the distinctness of reality. You climb the stairs that lead to the new position, or you shake the hand of the friend who congratulates you on your success, or you sit in the home that is now yours. You make the action single, simple, and vivid. You repeat it over and over with the minimum of effort, permeating your mind with the feeling of the wish fulfilled until that feeling takes on the solidity and distinctness of an actual experience.

Drowsiness facilitates this entrance into the fourth dimension because it quiets the outer senses and favors attention without strain. Yet you do not push to the stage of sleep in which control is lost. You remain in that moderate state of relaxation where you can still direct your thoughts. In this relaxed and sleepy state you repeat, like a lullaby, a short phrase that implies fulfillment: “Thank you,” spoken inwardly as though addressing the depth of your own being for having already brought the desired thing to pass. You continue until the imaginary action possesses the feeling of reality, until you are lost in the scene and the outer world fades.

When you do this you are actually performing the action in the fourth-dimensional world. Whether or not you awaken there in full consciousness, the deed is done. You will re-enact it later in the third-dimensional world as an objective fact. The assumption, though unreal to the senses at the moment you make it, if persisted in until it hardens into the feeling of reality, will externalize itself. Assumptions, though denied by the evidence of the moment, have the power to mold the future because they are fed into the deeper dimension where time itself is plastic.

You who feel stuck, who look upon your present conditions and see only limitation, hear this: the very conditions that now seem so solid are but cross-sections of a greater reality that you can reshape. The unemployed man, the one burdened by debt, the one whose body appears diseased, each is looking at a single slice of a four-dimensional drama. By thinking fourth-dimensionally you step out of that slice and enter the whole, where you rearrange the order of events. You do not fight the appearance; you simply move along time’s length in imagination and view the desired outcome as already accomplished. You see the entire array of impressions that would accompany the fulfillment, not in the order in which they would normally unfold, but as a present, living whole.

This is what it means to live in the fourth dimension. Your focus takes in the complete experience that would be yours were the desire now realized. You feel the joy, the relief, the naturalness of the new state. You do not speculate about how it will come to pass; you know that in the fourth dimension all means are good because the assumption itself inspires every movement, every word, every circumstance necessary for its fulfillment. The outer world of length, width, and height will simply reflect what you have already established in the deeper dimension.

Man does not know what a dimensionally larger world truly is and would perhaps deny the existence of a dimensionally larger self. He is familiar with length, width, and height and imagines that any fourth dimension should be equally obvious. Yet time measures your life without employing those three dimensions at all. There is no such thing as an instantaneous object. Everything endures for a definite length of time, and that endurance can be measured independently of length, width, and height. Time is therefore a fourth way of measuring, and the more dimensions an object possesses the more substantial and real it becomes.

When you think fourth-dimensionally you treat time not as a linear path you must plod along helplessly but as a dimension you can move through at will. You can see the future because you have stepped into the dimension where past, present, and future coexist as one animated whole. You can alter that future because you are no longer a passive observer of cross-sections but the very author of the four-dimensional body itself. The world you now think so solidly real is a shadow out of which and beyond which you may pass at any moment.

To prove this to yourself you have only to focus your attention upon an invisible state and imagine that you see and feel it. Remain concentrated in that state and your present environment will dissolve, giving way to the new condition. You awaken in a dimensionally larger world where the object of your contemplation has become a concrete objective reality. Should you then abstract your thoughts still further and retreat deeper within, space itself would again externalize in a larger form. Time and space are serial, and the drama of life is the climbing of a multitudinous dimensional ladder. But you need not wait for scientists to explain the serial universe. In practice you use it tonight by concerning yourself only with the two worlds immediately accessible to you.

You who are now listening, perhaps weary from years of struggle in the three-dimensional world, know that the change you seek is not accomplished by altering the shadow but by entering the substance. You define your desire clearly. You construct a single imaginary action that implies its fulfillment. You relax the body until it borders on sleep. Then, in this quiet state, you feel yourself performing that action here and now with all the vividness of reality. You keep the action going, feelingly, until it possesses the distinctness of an actual event. You do not force; you permit the feeling to deepen naturally. When the imaginary scene has the solidity of fact you release it and return gently to the outer world, confident that what you have done in the fourth dimension will externalize in the third.

This is not a theory to be pondered; it is a practice to be lived. Every night, as you approach the borderland of sleep, you have the opportunity to think fourth-dimensionally. Instead of reviewing the troubles of the day, you review the fulfillment of your desire. You climb the ladder, you receive the good news, you occupy the new position, you feel the embrace of the loved one now restored to harmony. You do this with the minimum of effort, yet with complete absorption, until the feeling of the wish fulfilled permeates your entire being. In this way you are feeding the mind with premises, assertions presumed to be true, and those assumptions, though unreal to the senses, will harden into facts.

The outer senses will continue to report the old conditions for a time, but you remain faithful to the vision. You know that consciousness is the only reality and that you have already moved in the fourth dimension and performed the act that must now appear. You do not argue with the senses; you simply return to the inner scene whenever doubt arises and renew the feeling of reality. In this manner the assumption influences the behavior of everyone and everything, inspiring the movements, the actions, and the words that tend toward its fulfillment. No one and no thing is independent of your consciousness, for all are but cross-sections of the greater four-dimensional reality you are now reshaping.

Consider how naturally this principle operates in the simplest acts of life. When you decide upon a goal you do not wait for the outer world to rearrange itself before you feel its fulfillment. You enter the fourth dimension at once and experience the end. You feel the naturalness of the new state so completely that the old state loses its hold. The three-dimensional world, being only a shadow, must conform to the change you have made in the substance. The imprisoned man who thinks fourth-dimensionally does not fight the bars; he feels himself walking freely in the outer world, shaking hands with friends, breathing the air of liberty. He keeps that imaginary action alive until it has the feeling of reality, and the bars dissolve because the greater reality has already been established.

You who feel trapped in any area of life, hear me clearly: the limitation you now experience exists only in the cross-section you are presently viewing. Step into the fourth dimension and you view the entire drama as a present whole. You select the slice that pleases you and you make it the dominant reality. You do not hope for change; you experience the change as already accomplished. Time, the fourth dimension, is plastic in your hands. You move along its length at will and select the condition you desire to externalize. The more completely you feel the reality of the chosen state, the more swiftly and perfectly it will appear in your world.

This thinking fourth-dimensionally is not an occasional exercise but a continual attitude of mind. You live in the end. You walk in the assumption that your desire is already realized. You speak from that assumption. You act from that assumption. In every moment you are either accepting the evidence of the three-dimensional cross-section or you are entering the fourth dimension and establishing a new cross-section that the outer world must eventually reflect. The choice is always yours.

When you retire at night, make this your last conscious act. Construct the scene that implies the fulfillment of your deepest desire. Enter it feelingly. Let the action unfold naturally until it possesses all the tones and textures of reality. Dwell there until the feeling of the wish fulfilled is so intense that you fall asleep in that state. In the morning, before the outer world claims your attention, return to the same scene and renew the feeling. Carry that feeling with you through the day as a quiet, unshakable knowing. You are no longer a victim of circumstances; you are the operant power moving in the fourth dimension, shaping the very substance from which all circumstances are formed.

The man who thinks fourth-dimensionally knows that every desire contains within itself the plan of its own expression. He does not condition the desire with doubts about how or when. He simply enters the fourth dimension, experiences the fulfillment, and lets the assumption do its perfect work. He trusts the deeper dimension completely because he has proven, again and again, that what is felt as real in the inner world must appear in the outer. The outer world is the harvest; the fourth dimension is the soil in which the seed is planted.

You may at first find it strange to think of time as a dimension you can navigate at will, yet the moment you successfully enter the feeling of the wish fulfilled you will know the truth of it. The outer conditions will begin to shift in subtle and then in dramatic ways. Friends will speak the words you imagined hearing. Opportunities will arise that match the scene you enacted in imagination. The very atmosphere around you will change because you have changed the four-dimensional reality that casts the three-dimensional shadow.

This is the majestic simplicity of thinking fourth-dimensionally. There is no struggle, no effort of the outer man. There is only the quiet withdrawal from the senses, the clear definition of the desired end, the single imaginative action that implies fulfillment, and the loving, persistent feeling of its reality until sleep or conviction claims you. In that state you are already in the fourth dimension. You have already performed the act. The future you desire is not ahead of you in linear time; it is now, in the deeper dimension, waiting only to be externalized.

You who have listened this far have already begun to move in the fourth dimension. The words themselves have carried you inward. Feel now, in this very moment, the quiet certainty that your desire is already accomplished. Let the sensation of fulfillment steal over you like a gentle tide. You are not hoping; you are knowing. You are not waiting; you are occupying the end. The cross-section the world now shows you is old; the new cross-section is being formed in the greater reality where you now dwell in imagination.

Every night you have the privilege of re-entering this dimension and reshaping your tomorrow. Every morning you have the power to carry the feeling of the wish fulfilled into the activities of the day. Do this faithfully and you will discover that the limitations which once seemed so solid were only the shadows of an unawakened consciousness. Awakened, you walk as a being who thinks fourth-dimensionally, and the world rearranges itself in harmony with your assumption.

The truth is eternal and ever-present. Time is not your master; you are the master of time. The three-dimensional world is not your prison; it is the stage upon which your four-dimensional creations appear. Enter the deeper dimension tonight. Feel the reality of your desire as already true. Live in that feeling and you will see, with your own eyes, how completely the outer world conforms to the inner. This is the great secret. This is the power that has always been yours. This is thinking fourth-dimensionally, and in this thinking you are free.

You are the operant power. You have always been. Tonight, as you close your eyes and enter that relaxed and drowsy state, remember these words and put them into living practice. Construct the scene. Feel the action. Dwell in the fulfillment until it is more real than the room in which you rest. Then fall asleep in that conviction, knowing that what you have done in the fourth dimension must appear in the third. The shadow will follow the substance. The cross-section will reflect the whole. Your world will change because you have changed in the only place where change is possible, the dimension of time, the dimension of imagination, the dimension of reality itself.

This is the gospel of the fourth dimension. This is the truth that sets you free. Live in it now, and every seeming barrier will dissolve, every unfulfilled longing will be satisfied, and you will know yourself as the being you have always been, the creator moving freely through the dimensions of consciousness, shaping your world according to your will. You are that being. You are thinking fourth-dimensionally. And in that thinking all things are possible unto you.