438. I may add here that even while we are living in our bodies, each one of us is in a community with spirits as to our own spirits even though we are unaware of it. Good people are in angelic communities by means of [their spirits] and evil people are in hellish communities. Further, we come into those same communities when we die. People who are coming into the company of spirits after death are often told and shown this.

Actually, we are not visible as spirits in our [spiritual] communities while we are living in the world because we are thinking on the natural level. However, if our thinking is withdrawn from the body we are sometimes visible in our communities because we are then in the spirit. When we are visible, it is easy to tell us from the spirits who live there because we walk along deep in thought, silent, without looking at others, as though we did not see them; and the moment any spirit addresses us, we disappear.

476. From childhood to old age everyone changes his place or location in the world of spirits. As a young child he is kept towards the north of the eastern sector. As a boy, as he begins to learn the rudiments of religion, he moves away by stages from the north towards the south. As a young man, as he begins to think for himself, he moves southwards; and later on, when he can exercise his own judgment and be his own master, in proportion to his development in matters which inwardly concern God and love towards the neighbour, south-eastwards. However, if his preference is for evil and he absorbs that, he moves towards the west. Everyone in the spiritual world has his dwelling-place determined by compass-points. The east is inhabited by those who have good from the Lord, for this is where the sun is, in the midst of which is the Lord. The north is inhabited by those who lack knowledge, the south by those who are intelligent, the west by those who are wicked.

[2] The person himself is not kept bodily in this gap or mid-region, but in his spirit; and as this changes its state, approaching good or else evil, the spirit is moved to places or locations in one or the other quarter, and comes into company with those who live there. It must, however, be known that it is not the Lord who moves them hither and thither, but the person moves himself in different ways. If he chooses good, then he together with the Lord, or rather the Lord together with him, moves his spirit eastwards. But if he chooses evil, then he together with the devil, or rather the devil together with him, moves his spirit westwards. It should be noted that where heaven is mentioned in this connection, the Lord is also meant, because the Lord is the all-in-all of heaven; and where the devil is mentioned, hell is meant, since that is where all the devils are.