“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(Intently:) They understand the beneficial teaching quality of disease, and follow their own instinctive ways of treating it. In a natural situation, this might involve a mass migration from one territory to another. In such cases the illness of only a few animals might send a whole herd to its safety, and a new food supply.

Such “thinking” exists, using the analogy, within the framework of instinct, whereas your own verbalized thoughts can also intrude outside of that framework. One of the main differences between you and the animals, and one of the significant meanings in terms of free will, is involved here.

(This was one of those times when she was consciously aware that several channels of information were available from Seth. We had but to decide which subject we wanted material on after break:

Illness therefore was experienced as “bad.” An entire tribe could be endangered by one sick member. At the same time, as the mind developed, cunning and memory became highly effective survival tools. In some societies or tribes, the old or infirm were killed lest their care take too much attention from the able-bodied and endanger the group.

(11:21.) The individuals alive at such a time will also have a hand in such decisions, however. Once more, because you are self-conscious beings your beliefs regulate your reality. An animal knows unconsciously that it is unique and has a place in the scheme of being. Its sense of grace is built-in. Your free will allows for the freedom of any belief, including one that says you are unworthy, with no right to your existence.

(Jane said there was much more to the idea of natural therapy in animals. She began tuning in to this information on her own, rather than getting it through one of Seth’s channels. Ages ago, humans not only watched the animals, but went to them for help. It had to do with shock treatment, she said wonderingly. If a human was in a catatonic state after a battle, for instance, the “animal medicine man” would purposely shock the patient into an emotional reaction to bring him out of the state.

While this may seem like the sheerest Pollyanna, nevertheless there is no evil in basic terms. This does not mean that you do not meet with effects that appear evil, but as you each move individually through the dimensions of your own consciousness, you will understand that all seeming opposites are other faces of the one supreme drive toward creativity.

(12:13 a.m. Jane still felt exhilarated, yet tired. A note: Lately she’s been working on a sequel to her novel, The Education of Oversoul 7, which she finished early in July, 1972. [See Jane’s Introduction, and Chapter One.] The new book is called, appropriately enough, The Further Education of Oversoul 7.)