“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(“Then I thought: I didn’t want to give real book sessions while I was asleep — who would take them down? Unless Rob could while he was asleep too. I knew we were on Chapter Nineteen of Seth’s book, and this confused me. How come I was doing an early chapter — or was this work for a different book?”

Dictation: Ruburt was working with alterations of consciousness this afternoon. At the same time he had the radio playing softly. The rock-music program was interrupted by an announcement having to do with the Indianapolis speed-car racing exhibition (the 57th Indianapolis 500-mile race). One driver had already been severely injured (on Monday); and the race, put off on that account, and because of inclement weather (on Tuesday), finally began today.

(9:32.) As he resumed “normal” consciousness Ruburt found himself wondering about the great violence involved, and the entire situation in which such people placed themselves. (He often has the radio on when he is working with alternate states of consciousness, by the way, using it as a point of reference.)

No one begins a race with a handicap, you may say, but that is obviously not the case. Individuals have often chosen such situations precisely as incentives, and many great men have done so. This does not mean that such disabilities are necessary. At any point that an individual realizes his point of power in the present, he will not need a barrier to test himself against, or to focus him in what he thinks of as the proper direction.

A person with several existences stressing intellectual achievement might purposely then decide upon a life in which mental abilities are beyond him, and the emotions allowed a full play that he had denied them “earlier.”

Now this accomplishment need not involve some great artwork or invention, or political leadership, for example, though it may. Often the successful activity represents a challenge on the part of the personality who set it in terms of psychological creativity, and the overall enrichment of experience. Those involved, such as family, will have acquiesced to the situation “earlier.” Often, particularly in the case of mental or physical birth defects, the incapacitated person will be accepting that role not only because of personal reasons; he or she will also be choosing that part for the family as a whole.

Now understand that the same thing applies in the case of unusual achievements. In those instances the achiever’s beliefs predominate, and yet apart from this he may also be acting out the unrealized aspirations of his family members, or of the group in which he is intimately involved. There will always be reasons for such interrelationships.

A person may choose a great talent instead, through which he or she will perceive reality and concentrate all experience. This will serve as a formidable focus, yet by its nature it may often preclude other experiences that many individuals find quite normal. Some artists with great ability may shut out intellectual maturity, utilizing native emotional qualities to such an extent and with such intensity that the mental reasoning faculties are largely shunted aside. (Pause.) Without rational illumination, the emotional elements may be so unwieldy that the artist, for all of his spontaneous expression, cannot relate in any kind of permanent situation of an intimate nature. For reason and emotion are natural counterparts.

Someone else may choose to focus upon intellectual achievement to such a degree that he shuts out all true closeness, and though he can accept a permanent relationship, he will not experience the emotional richness that others may derive from a much briefer encounter. Therefore each of you choose — ahead of time, in your terms — the kind of framework through which you will contend with this life situation. This applies personally and collectively.