“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

I was totally alert and critical at the time, focused at a high point of concentration, though, in that all of my attention was pivoted expectantly. The experience was fascinating and increasingly enjoyable. Earlier, I’d sipped beer as I watched television. Now the half-full glass was beside me. I drank some now and then, and also smoked. A strong sense of exhilaration was present, as was the feeling of great energy. There was no feeling that any particular personality was giving me the information, yet there was the certainity that the words were being delivered from somewhere or someone outside my own reality. They didn’t seem to well up from inside me, but to be dropped down into my head.

At the same time, the people in the apartment downstairs got company. They came tramping and laughing up the steps just beneath my open window. Suddenly, the sound of traffic also bothered me. I’d been unaware of it only a moment before. Now, the cars went rushing through the rain. All of these sounds merged together, intensified, while each retained its own unique quality.

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.

Nearly three more pages of dictation followed, coming in the same way as before. Because of the nature of the material, I thought I might be shown how to enter a probable moment from the present one. Initial instructions were given, though only preliminary, but I was ready to follow them. Now the speaker was addressing me, where the earlier monologue had been impersonal. At this point, unfortunately, our company arrived. I was really disappointed, but shook my consciousness to set it back to daily things, and with only a moment of reorientation attended to my guests.

Along with the last sentence, I saw an image that is difficult to explain. It was a rectangular object that reminded me of a gadget shown to us once by Jim Beal from NASA that reacted to light and another that reacted to pressure. Both of those gadgets turned all colors and achieved different stages of transparency and opaqueness. So did the object I saw now. It was supposed to represent the moment as we perceive it. The center section of the rectangle was most opaque and the ends most transparent. There were new bursts of noise from downstairs at this point, and the image vanished.

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.’

In this experience, it is Thanksgiving Day. My mother’s family is here also. I am in the sunroom watching my father take food from a buffet set in the dining room. My mother and her sister are in there, talking. Suddenly my father becomes angry, throws his plate onto the rug and grabs another. My mother begins to cry. I remember probabilities, however, and instead of becoming upset myself, I send my father thoughts of peace and health. I know that now the scene will not happen this Thanksgiving in physical reality — that I have helped choose another more positive one. The scene ends. I feel as though I have been both watching and participating. I hear Seth remark: ‘You learn well, and manipulate equally well.’

You did very well. Now, because you are interested in probabilities, you will have many more experiences along these lines. We will hopscotch back and forth with our friend Ruburt, for this is also one of his main lines of interest. Your own experience can be used to benefit the class at large, for you must be led to see that you can alter physical events in such a way. You must be led to see that there are other dimensions of reality.

He spoke with such rich understanding humor that everyone laughed, including Shirley. Through this entire period, Seth spoke on probabilities in our own private sessions, as well as in class. He was halfway through his own book, Seth Speaks: The Eternal Validity of the Soul which he is completing now and in which he gives further methods that can be used to experience probable realities.

‘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?’

Vague something about York Beach couple — are they happier now on an inner level? I think I sensed them re-assessing themselves.

Later the couple just disappeared as far as we were concerned. We thought they might have left while we weren’t watching them. But from that night on, Rob began to improve. We danced all night, and now dancing is one of our favorite activities. We knew that something had happened very important to our lives, but we had no idea what was really involved.

Now, this is not dictation [on Seth’s own book], but it is some material that Ruburt can use in his dream book. I want to comment, therefore, on the experience of your friend, Sue Watkins, and its connection with the probable universe.

Now, Ruburt has also done the same service for a probable Sue in another system of reality, though in an entirely different way. And you [Rob], incidentally, have helped a probable Carl [Sue’s husband] in the same manner, using his creative abilities. The probable Carl, in other words, has strong creative abilities, and you have helped him understand this.

Now, in the life of each personality there are, of course, moments of deep crisis and decision, where a personality decides upon one of various possible choices. These moments are not necessarily conscious at all, and the choices are not necessarily conscious, though often they rise to consciousness. But by then, the inner work and decision has been done.

It’s one thing to accept the idea of probable systems and probable selves as an exciting intellectual concept, and quite another to accept the practical considerations involved if you think of probabilities as plain facts of existence. Quite frankly, I didn’t expect any of us to have practical experience along these lines, thinking that any probable realities were beyond our reach. But we weren’t finished yet, and I doubt that we are now. As you’ll see, Sue kept in touch with the probable Rob and Jane in her dreams. Through our experiences, the concept became a reality with which we were confronted.