This is one of those questions that is kind of loaded.  Many people are trying to address the changes that are coming down the pike.   I would suggest that while most have really good intentions, sometimes more confusion than clarity is added to the mix.  Without going into all of this, let me say that huge shifts, such as the one referenced in the question, are not really a linear process.  Granted, you live on a planet where time is linear and where most people observe their own experiences in a linear way (such as growing up from a point of infancy through childhood, adolescence, and adulthood).  That seems pretty linear, and certainly it appears that way.  However, when we are talking about really big pictures, and this is one of those, it’s not truly linear.  When many people talk about the third and fourth dimension, I find they’re not particularly clear about what they mean.  

When we’re speaking about dimensional realities and we refer to the third dimension, we’re looking at the level of how things were created in this physical universe.   This is a third dimensional universe.  That means there is height, width and depth.  Technically, the fourth dimension was introduced to scientists back around the turn of the 20th century by Albert Einstein.  He postulated that the fourth dimension was actually the dimension of time.  As he went into discovering what this might mean, he developed the Theory of Relativity that has influenced great thinkers ever since.  So when we talk about third and fourth dimensions, we have to be clear about whether we are talking about the physical dimensions of Earth or whether we’re talking about something else.

You could say that the universe itself exists in nine different dimensions.  Certainly there are two-dimensional realities, but there’s not much movement on them.  In addition, learning in a two-dimensional reality is quite different from learning in a three-dimensional reality.  We could say that learning in a four-dimensional reality is going to take on certain qualities or characteristics that have not truly been understood by the masses yet.  

If we allow that time might be the fourth dimension, we have to ask, “Is the only way we can experience time in a linear fashion?”  Indeed, that is the way most people experience it.  But there is another level of experiencing that goes beyond physical reality where time is experienced somewhat differently than in a linear flow.  Actually, time doesn’t flow.  People try to explain their experiences by using the phrase, “the flow of time”.  Even I use that because most people have an understanding of what that means.  However, if we were to extend ourselves into a four-dimensional reality where time (which is much less concrete than height, width and depth) is actually a dimension, we would experience a big shift in consciousness.  Generally speaking, this is what people are referring to when they use these words third and fourth dimensions, even though that is not technically accurate for what happens on a physical planet.  In physical reality we have to hold to the parameters of that reality.  That’s why, for so many years, the only three dimensions that could be postulated were height, width, and depth.  But now, since Mr. Einstein’s brilliant offerings, another dimension can be postulated.

First we must understand how the physical dimension affects time.  We could say that time can only be experienced on certain planets or bodies in space that have pattern.  If the planet itself is not moving there is no time. Now, if we were to perch ourselves on the edge of a black hole, there would be absolutely no time.  (Of course this is physically impossible because anyone who gets within miles and miles of a black hole would be consumed by it. Indeed star systems are sometimes consumed by black holes).  However, were it possible to perch right on the edge of a black hole, and if you were to suddenly find a way to negotiate going into that black hole, you would discover that time, in its dimensional quality, is flowing in a pattern that could be perceived as going backwards.  That’s not technically correct either, but perhaps that gives you some way to access this experience of time as a creative phenomenon.  

When you are on a planet, the pull of the planet’s gravitational, centripetal, and centrifugal forces actually curve time so that the time experienced on the planet is not linear.  Rather, it takes the shape of that planet.  We have to ask, what this might mean in terms of evolving consciousness.   It’s probably going to be fairly significant, and yet I don’t think the masses of humanity have really evolved enough to understand the potential power/ creative power, of time outside its perceived linear focus.  

So these are very interesting questions, and I love that individuals are mulling these things over in their minds, trying to understand them.  The more people think about these things, the sooner there will be instances where certain things can be observed within the physical world.  This is a very important part of the process.

As far as this planet, or human beings on this planet, slipping into a fourth dimension is concerned; it’s not exactly possible to do that in a physical reality.  A three-dimensional reality allows for a much greater expansion of consciousness than in say, a two dimensional reality.  This is true as we consider fourth-dimensional reality as well.   We don’t so much leave a third reality behind as we get that and something more.  While these states of being certainly can be postulated, it’s very difficult to chart a map as to how it’s going to happen.  

Many of you realize that the year 2012 is highly important to a great number of people.  A lot of people have set this as the date when the Earth officially enters the Aquarian Age.  Given the way the energetic shifts are happening on the planet right now, I think it’s very likely that 2012 is going to be a pretty important year, not only in human evolution but in planetary evolution as well.  We can understand why there is so much commotion around it.  However, this is not the point that is slated for some big collective shift in consciousness where people on the planet experience time as a fourth dimension.  

(Those of you who are interested in astrology may enjoy an article I prepared for the July 2009 issue of the Sedona Journal.  In it, I take a huge overview of the journey of  Earth going back about 13,000 years.  It gives an astrological take on what exiting the Piscean Age and moving into the Aquarian Age might mean)