“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Jane doesn’t often refer to such world events in her notes and journals, but we often talk about them. In fact, she made no notes of any kind in her 1980 journal from the middle of June to July 20, for a span of five weeks, but those two months were busy times for us professionally. In June, I started experimenting with paintings of my dream images, for use in a possible book—and this endeavor, I discovered, presented me with a whole set of challenges all by itself. I mailed the finished manuscripts for Mass Events and God of Jane to our publisher on July 2 and 18 respectively. During those times, however, I was extremely sorry to note that Jane’s physical symptoms—her difficulties “walking” and performing other routine tasks—were obviously becoming much worse.

1. I don’t mean to imply that it was particularly easy to assemble these notes. It took me days. Sometimes over the years, in my frustration at being unable to find a certain line or passage in a session, or in something Jane or I have written, I’ve ended up thinking that I merely imagined its being: “It doesn’t really exist at all,” I’ve told myself, “so why am I wasting my time looking for it?” Yet once I start hunting, it’s difficult to stop until I’ve exhausted all reasonable chances of finding what I want. Even a thorough indexing of every paper we have in the house, including each page of the Seth material, often wouldn’t locate the kinds of references I need. To suit me, I’ve told Jane more than once, the index would have to be practically as long as our lifework itself. I’ve gone through those episodes a number of times. (So have others, according to their letters, even though the books are indexed.)

2. When Jane and I married on December 27, 1954, we promised each other that neither one of us would interfere with the other’s creative approach to life, no matter what resulted from the actions we individually chose. We have kept those promises for the 26 years we’ve been together. Of course, we couldn’t possibly have foreseen the great variety of challenges that lay before us. Nine years were to pass before Jane began coming through with the Seth material. She’s certainly given me the complete freedom to be myself, and I’ve floundered often. So has she. Yet as the years passed I still had to learn the obvious—that Jane’s creative powers are inextricably a part of her whole approach to life, including her symptoms. How could it be otherwise? That doesn’t stop me from desperately wanting to help her. I’ve tried, in many ways. She’s helped me often. Jane even agrees with me that she’s a very stubborn lady—albeit an extremely creative one—who’s determined to go her own way.

A. From Jane’s journal for 1975. She doesn’t recall the month in which she wrote this—only that she did so at high speed:

“I think the fill-in sessions happen between book sessions, for a change of pace—where the material doesn’t have to fit a more concentrated overall book focus,” Jane added. She agreed to write a short account of what she’d just told me, for the record.)