“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

In terms of personality as you understand it, the individual chooses the abilities he or she will have, and the life challenges. [...] (Long pause.) It goes without saying that any human being possesses the latent ability shown by a great artist or athlete, or statesman or philosopher. Within creaturehood there are wide ranges of abilities; these may be seldom used, but they are there as practical ideals that can be expressed within that system. In the same way, every individual possesses the abilities of its entity in latent form. [...]

[...] You may believe that your current existence, with all of its abilities and challenges, is the result of that past life, yet both exist at once. [...]

The greatest abilities of a personality may often be brought into physical expression, however, because of certain rhythms that are not understood. [...]

(10:05.) Ruburt’s abilities—and your own, for that matter—came to light because they are natural characteristics of your beings. [...] (Pause.) In a strange fashion he does not feel a responsibility to write poetry—he doesn’t use the ability because he thinks that he should. [...]

Use your abilities (underlined); a fine idea, a good policy, an excellent course—but not when it is considered a commandment. [...]

It seems to him as if he would—if he were using all of his abilities as he should—be a public figure. [...]

[...] Part of the difficulty in what Ruburt thinks of as the development of his abilities, or the more frequent insertion of inspirational work of his own, is the very fact that he feels so responsible to so thusly perform. [...]

Some for you are, also: but divest yourself of all your beliefs that you did not fully understand or use your painting abilities “in your youth.” [...] “Why couldn’t I have known when I was a young man about my abilities, and how best to use them?” Think of yourself as a young man using them, and you will automatically be free of many hampering concepts in your work.

[...] Ruburt simply identified with too-small a portion of himself, not realizing that left alone his abilities would draw from Framework 2 all that was required for their fulfillment—all of the impulses, desires, and circumstances. He thought, as you did, that artistic abilities were like alien flowers in an unfriendly land, that had to be force-fed and protected at all costs.

Have him read over my sessions again, to remind himself that his abilities spring from Framework 2, and do not need such overprotection. [...]

[...] You have some abilities here, but those same abilities can also confuse you. [...]

[...] He will not return, but go to another reality where his abilities can be used to more advantage.

[...] You are not to look backward, but forward for the very fulfillment of your own abilities—and I am speaking to you both—will come as a direct result of your acquaintanceship with your son.

[...] For his abilities could not have been used fully in this existence and he would have met frustration.

[...] If I thought you had no abilities of your own, and this applies to all of you, if I did not know that you were multidimensional personalities with all kinds of abilities at your disposal, then I would not tell you to think and feel for yourselves. I would not say you have the ability within you to solve your own problems. [...]

[...] What I am trying to do is to awaken within each of you knowledge, intuition, abilities that are a portion of your entire personality. [...] These abilities will help you solve other problems. [...]

You can indeed provided it is within the abilities of the physical self. Now, the teaching abilities are within your capabilities. [...]

And if I solved them for you, then you would go about your way, but you would have no faith in your own abilities and you would have learned nothing. [...]

[...] I think it came to me because of my concern recently over the new idea I’d come across—concerning Jane’s ideas about her relationship with Seth, her feelings about her abilities versus his, etc. I must admit that I am still rather surprised to understand, finally, that Jane has entertained feelings of inferiority about her abilities as related to those of Seth.

[...] She knew she had the ability but feared the consequences of its use socially and personally. At the same time she wanted to use the ability but keep it under control.”

[...] He told himself that if he were using his abilities as he should, he would then naturally seek out their public expression. [...]

He took it for granted that, ideally speaking, he should do such public work, that it was his responsibility, but also that it represented a natural expression of abilities that he was denying because of his fears. [...]

[...] You have your own abilities to work with however. [...] But expect abundance and the release of all your abilities.

Remember that all of your behavior was not negative however, and give thanks for those abilities and accomplishments that are your own. [...]

[...] Calling upon this inner power, for it is power, will bring about the fulfillment of many other abilities and strengths that are within you. [...]

He still believed in the fantastic ability of destruction, and he tried to cover it up. [...]

[...] Your own ability as a draftsman, if the term is the correct one—your technical ability—was adopted for two reasons.

In this life therefore this high technical ability allowed you to paint, for without it you would have been too frightened of the inner sensibilities necessary. [...]

[...] (Long pause.) These elements helped form and define your abilities, adding to their particular and peculiar nature.

Imagine the vision on the board, forming itself and evolving outward into physical reality, and let your fine technical abilities simply help the vision flow outward.

Now, to some extent, you and Ruburt felt enough the same way to make the analogy feasible, only Ruburt was the one who constructed the edifice that would protect his own abilities, first of all, and yours as well. [...] With such an edifice, Ruburt can only use his abilities under certain conditions, and he imagines all kinds of impulses, situations, or whatever, that might steal them away, or steal away the time necessary to express them. [...]

Unfortunately, the system itself began to impede the very abilities it was meant to protect. Such abilities must have freedom, and insist upon it, and so the security system itself always felt in jeopardy. [...]

You must realize that expression and not repression is the natural complement of creative abilities, and that in freeing his body, in encouraging physical mobility, he also encourages and frees his inspiration, his psychic awareness, and creativity.

(2. I found myself wondering if my own attitudes might have strongly influenced Jane’s early psychic behavior in ways neither of us suspected—that she may have inhibited certain elements of her abilities because she feared my own ideas about distractions, time, failure, etc. [...] I do know that Jane has the abilities to perform all of those activities, and this almost idle realization recently may have triggered the more concrete question.

[...] To be creative in Ruburt’s particular way, you need a variety of characteristics that will allow you to probe alone into the nature of your own experience, and yet abilities that will also help you relate to the world—and Ruburt has those necessary abilities. [...]

Now: the creative abilities deal primarily with Framework 2 orientation.

The next natural step would be to reassimilate those portions of the self, to acknowledge their ancient origins and abilities, to return them so that they form a new coating, as it were, or a new version of selfhood. [...] Your idea of the devil represents the same kind of process, except that it stands for your idea of evil or darkness, or abilities that you are afraid of. [...]

[...] You end up with Christs, spacemen, various saints or spirits, or other personality fabrications whose characteristics and abilities are already known.

[...] He feels he is being crucified by his own abilities. [...]

[...] It [did so] because many of the behavior patterns associated, now, with schizophrenia, are “distorted and debased” remnants of behavior patterns that are part and parcel of man’s heritage, and that harken back to activities and abilities that at one time had precise social meaning, and served definite purposes.

The dimensions of such mental enclosures are governed by the particular ability of the particular consciousness to receive, withstand and utilize energy. This ability is more or less elastic; that is, the ability can expand, and no rigid rules apply to it in a limiting manner.

[...] In the dream Ruburt said the material told him that he had cancer, because in a previous life he did have clairvoyant knowledge, through his psychic ability, of his future disease; and since his psychic ability has only lately come to light with this material, you can see the connection.

[...] It is distributed therefore throughout energy, or within it, in much the same way that creative ability is distributed throughout or within, say, a particular personality.

The results of it can be perceived in the actions carried out by a given personality, but as you cannot separate creative ability, or take it out of an individual for examination, so you cannot separate comprehension of itself from energy.

[...] This ability is a natural one, operating to some degree or another within every personality. [...] The individual’s health is determined by his ability to take advantage of, or to use, this mechanism.

There are ways in which this natural ability can be strengthened, and it may be of benefit that we discuss them. These ways will not only be helpful in facilitating these automatic health correction tendencies, but will also be generally beneficial as far as all inner abilities are concerned.

A while earlier this evening Ruburt read something that made him wonder whether or not he had, or could develop, healing ability. [...]

They will allow you to increase your clairvoyant and telepathic abilities. [...]

[...] Too much restraint could eventually make the abilities inoperable. [...] The ability grows as it is used. [...]

[...] Not to use the ability in the face of sudden or spontaneous impressions can, under certain conditions, impede your progress. [...]

Ruburt is himself and this self is a writer and this self has strong psychic abilities. [...]

The development of his psychic abilities frightened him, for the very simple reason that in his mind a psychic did not have the same kind of status. The writing abilities were always one manifestation of his own strong psychic nature, however, and his growth as a personality required the merging of both if even the writer was to succeed. [...] (Intently.) His improvements are the natural result of a synthesis of personality and abilities and a reorganization of beliefs.

[...] In the meantime his intellect and intuitive abilities both discovered that the daily joy of living was important—as important as “work” or money.

[...] I want him to concentrate, now, upon those beliefs that are working for him, to quite consciously build up the sense of his own worth by listing the uses to which he has put his abilities. [...]

For a week I want you to concentrate on Ruburt’s good points and abilities and accomplishments also when you think of him, until I get further in our book. [...]

“The material itself is—if you’ll forgive the term—cleverly executed; so that as you grapple to understand it, you are already beginning to use abilities beyond those that you take for granted.

[...] He says: “When you look into yourself, the very effort involved extends the limitations of your consciousness, expands it, and allows the egotistical self to use abilities that it often does not realize it possesses.”

The Inner Senses are not important because they release clairvoyant or telepathic abilities, but because they reveal to us our own independence from physical matter, and let us recognize our unique, individual multidimensional identity. [...]

The Inner Senses help us use telepathic abilities, for example. [...]

Ruburt’s writing abilities have blossomed because of his psychic experiences. Your painting abilities have also … The psychic breakthrough did not just occur. Your deepest natures called it out of the probable sequence into your joint reality — for a reason, because each of you knew that it could best help you to develop all of your respective abilities to their fullest, and also help others.

[...] In many instances one main personality is formed, and the incipient selves are drawn into it so that their abilities and interests become subsidiary, or remain largely latent. [...]

[...] In a way they were unfocused, yet each with strong abilities, but dispersed. [...]

In another system of reality your father was — in fact, still is — a well-known inventor, who never married but used his mechanically creative abilities to the fullest while avoiding emotional commitment. [...]

[...] Imagine that at age 13, three strong energy centers come to the surface of the personality — highly charged, so that one person cannot adequately fulfill the desires or abilities presented. [...]