“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

As I finished the first page, Rob came out, passed me and went into the kitchen. I was surprised that he didn’t know without being told, as he usually does, that something was going on, and I didn’t want to talk to anyone. Finally I managed to say, “Hon, don’t bother me.” It took great effort for me to withdraw that much energy away from what I was doing. But, instead of understanding, Rob began emptying the garbage into paper bags. The crinkley sound seemed magnified tremendously and had a new dimension as if it were ripping up space, crinkling the edges of space in the kitchen. Later, Rob said that he never heard me speak to him and questioned whether I’d really spoken. I thought I had, of course.

I wanted to cry, and for a moment I almost did — to be so interrupted. Rob went on bagging the garbage. It seemed now that we were separated by a great distance that had nothing to do with space. I couldn’t bridge it just then to explain what was happening or to ask him to stop. He went out and returned after emptying the garbage. The kids downstairs, full of fun, began yelling with great energy on the porch. Finally, the sounds quieted. I waited.

Each probable event is changed by each other probable event. There is constant simultaneous interaction. These ‘separate’ probable systems do not operate isolated from each other, then, but are intimately connected. All systems are open. The physical moment is transparent, though you give it a time-solidity. You see it as opaque.

In what other worlds, for example, do you sit writing these notes? Put down your glasses.

Slide imaginatively into a world where you do not perform the next small action you will perform in this world. Cough, smile, sneeze — in some other actuality your actions are non-actions and your non-acts are realized.

Greet the now-realization of all of your dreams, for they also participate in the probable system. As your dreams bleed into your normal conscious life, so do they bleed into other probabilities. A dream act is actualized by a waking you, as a waking you is actualized by a dreaming self.

Suddenly I am yanked away from this scene, and Carl [Sue’s husband] and I are sitting in a large room with Jane as Seth. Seth turns to Carl and gives him a long lecture. Carl smiles at him, and Seth says, ‘Now at the count of three, you will go into a deeper trance.’ Carl begins to do so. I lie down on the couch and say, ‘Wow, to be out at the count of three?’ I close my eyes.

Seth touches my shoulder, smiling. He tells me that I am to do something else and gives me a long, friendly lecture. The content is lost now, but I think it had to do with my own psychic development. Then Seth says, ‘In the earlier dream demonstration tonight, your father had problems of his own, and you ignored them. The whole house was aware of your feelings and absorbed them. It will be aware of them for some time.’

On hearing this, I feel sorry and eerie, as I imagine the house actually absorbing my ill feelings. Seth then says that I can do the whole scene over by a simple method of stepping sideways into physical reality; he tells me that this is easier than I might suppose.

Using a series of mental exercises explained to me by Seth, I do step sideways — it is as though I am squeezing between two bars, and I find myself back in the bedroom with my father there, again, complaining. This time I change the events from the way they happened the first time, realize how important his problems are to him, smile and send him good thoughts. At once I am propelled into another, similar scene.

There I see, to my surprise and joy, Jane and Rob Butts sitting talking to some other people. Or are they Jane and Rob? They are older-looking and both look very cynical about whatever they are discussing. I wonder if the town is Sayre, Pennsylvania and if we are all really there or if we have made this place up. The other people go away, and I go sit down next to Jane, and, to my surprise, they do not acknowledge or recognize me at all.

I look up and notice an older, short, stout man in a dark purple robe of some sort sitting across from us and realize with a jolt that it is Seth! I say, ‘Do you know him?’ and point. Jane laughs. ‘You mean old Saint Nick over there?’ I (whatever one it is) cringe.

‘In that probability, you, Rob, painted constantly and Jane had published a bunch of short stories, a novel and poetry even before this got started. Do you do this now?’

I nod and we walk out of the restaurant — Seth trailing along behind. We walk down a shaded, quiet street and turn in at a large white house with a screened lower porch. There is a large tree to the left of the porch, and a weedy driveway leads back to a large white barnish-looking building with double top-hinged doors. We go up a set of outside stairs and into an apartment which seems to have a large living room. Rob is about to haul out some paintings — they seem to be landscapes — when he groans in agony and nearly falls down in pain from his back, apparently. He manages to lie down on the floor and I try to show him some yoga exercises for it, but he brushes me off. I suddenly feel desperate to do something for them before it all ends.

The experience was quite legitimate, and it was meant as a lesson on many levels. First of all, it is apparent that there is communication between various systems of probabilities and that actions in one system can and do affect the other.

The couple do exist, probable selves of your own in a different system. Your friend, in developing her own abilities, has become involved with activities in probable fields and was drawn to the couple emotionally because of her emotional connection with you in this system.

What I want you to see here is that the communications do not just operate in a vertical, ascending or descending fashion, but horizontally, in those terms.

There is no need to go further into their history, but I assure you that it was in keeping with the characteristics that you gave them; and remember, these were your own strongest fears. With all of this however latent, you see, they had your potential. I was able to make an inadequate but definite contact, and their existence can still be changed and altered, for they have free will, as you do.