“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

I was delighted when Jane began to show physical improvements almost at once during those early August days, and so was she. It’s not contradictory to note that during August and September, following his regular schedule of twice-weekly sessions, Seth methodically presented some very exciting concepts. So closely do those 13 sessions fit together that it’s most difficult to give excerpts.⁵ Seth’s magical-approach material represents one of his best efforts to help us, as well as others. Jane’s difficulties certainly inspired them, but their creativity also goes beyond our own needs. And as soon as I realized she was going to continue the series for a while, I jokingly asked her what was going on: “What do you think you’re up to, hon? Are you doing a book within a book, or what?” My wife didn’t answer yes or no, but I could see that she was pleased, and that she was thinking about it. The title of the new book would be automatic: The Magical Approach to Reality: A Seth Book.

Early in September Tam mailed back to us, for our approval, the copy-edited 484-page manuscript for Mass Events. An independent reader had gone over our labors line by line, checking for everything from grammar and contradictions to philosophy, “flagging” questions for us by noting them on slips of pink paper taped to the appropriate manuscript pages. Along with our other projects—including answering a steady flow of letters—Jane and I spent the month going over Mass Events, accepting some suggestions but rejecting many others. On the 13th we received from Sue Watkins our first copy of Volume 1 of Conversations With Seth, Sue’s excellent account of the ESP classes Jane used to hold in one of the two apartments we rented in downtown Elmira, before we moved to the hill house outside of town in 1975. Sue was now working on the last two chapters of the second and last volume of Conversations. Early in October I returned Mass Events to our publisher once more; it was ready to be set in type. Jane kept at her poetry and essays right into that first week in October, while her physical improvements continued to show in a modest way. Her walking especially was better, and I was able to take her on an occasional drive in the beautiful country.

That first, July 23rd entry at Three Mile Island took place on day 263 of the seizing of the American hostages in Iran. See Note 1 for Session 919, in Chapter 7 of Dreams, wherein I reviewed not only Iran’s concern over the Russian invasion of its eastern neighbor, Afghanistan, in late December 1979, but also Iran’s border clashes with its western neighbor, Iraq, during the past year. Finally, on September 23 [day 325 of the hostage situation], the inevitable happened in the very unstable Middle East: Amid that explosive mixture of secular and religious national consciousnesses “at work” there, Iraq launched an outright invasion of Iran. Quickly Iraq began to gobble up large portions of Iranian territory. The whole Western world became alarmed, for economic reasons as well as others.

(I was curious as to why Seth had devoted two other private sessions in late September to different subjects. When I asked Jane about this tonight, at first she rather matter-of-factly said that she didn’t know. Then: “Well, I don’t tell you everything, but for some time now I’ve known that Seth gives what I call fill-in sessions. I’ve labeled them that way in my mind. They cover floating material—stuff he could give any time. They aren’t book sessions or really personal ones. They keep the sessions going over periods of time—usually by discussing past material—connecting it to the present, while not necessarily adding new stuff. And not specifically given on one subject. Originally I think the Christ sessions got started that way.”