“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

But what initiated the “Idea Construction” experience? Even when I wrote The Seth Material, I didn’t clearly understand why it happened or connect it in any way with my previous life or beliefs. It seemed like a complete intrusion. This present book, devoted to dreams and subjective experience, led me into deeper self-examination. In preparation, I reread my own records and poetry. The poetry itself provides a clear record of subjective thoughts and emotions. And it was through reading this old poetry that I found clues that showed me the points of continuity between my life before my psychic initiation and after it.

The poems show my attitude toward life in general just before my psychic experiences began. When you see the type of poetry that I was writing then, you will understand immediately why the ideas in “Idea Construction” were such a revelation to me. Incidentally, I considered these poems as aesthetic creations. I made no effort at the time to examine my own subjective states — I simply expressed them as best I could and then criticized the poems on their aesthetic merits. The way I saw life was the way life was! It never occurred to me that my own attitudes had anything to do with it.

Rob always enjoyed excellent health, but in 1963 he came down with severe back trouble. Certainly this frightened me and was probably partly responsible for the feelings expressed in the following poem — feelings, I think, that are quite prevalent during early adulthood:

I was untouched ten years ago,
By love and even pain.
The world touched me or touched me not.
To me it was the same.

In other words, my poetry finally revealed to me my state of mind before “Idea Construction” and Seth. Little by little, using it as a guide, other memories came back to me — all trivial in comparison to real tragedy and yet, to me, bitterly depressing. The death of a kitten that year led me to write:

A small household tragedy, the death of a cat, yet to me it contained the question of the uniqueness of life and the value of consciousness. Didn’t anyone or anything care that one cat had died? I felt guilty even considering the question. In a world where humans slaughtered their own kind constantly, who in their right mind would give a moment’s thought to a cat’s consciousness? Yet either all life was sacred, or none of it was. So I brooded.

And when I looked around me, it seemed that for all of man’s good intentions, he only transmitted the errors of his race; that each man or woman unknowingly perpetuated the peculiar sins and failings of their families. I wrote one of my most pessimistic of poems:

I think that my “Idea Construction” experience was initiated, then, at least in part, by the need that is apparent in these poems. The last two show early indications of emerging intuitive knowledge. I believe that I had gone as far as my intellect and normal creativity could take me and that new channels were opened when I needed them most. Generally, I think, these other channels open when we have ceased to rely upon most of the answers that have been given to us by others and found wanting. (Along these lines, I wonder if tranquilizers often cut us off from such intuitive breakthroughs by preventing us from coming to grips with the true “darkness of soul” that can precede such experiences and by allowing us to accept temporary, objective and artificial solutions.)