“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Begin the yoga exercises and follow them faithfully. Your few experiments with autosuggestion upon falling asleep have been ego-bound. Think of this in terms of muscle-bound, and you will see what I mean. Be in a drowsy state and suggest, Ruburt, suggest — suggest, Joseph. Do not attempt to bully or command the subconscious. Joseph, if you are uncomfortable, I suggest you move to your sturdy old rocker.

Following Seth’s suggestions, Rob began doing a few simple yoga exercises, and the night before the eighteenth session he used self-hypnosis to relax his muscles. The results were so immediate and excellent, and Rob was so limp when he finished, that both of us were amused. He looked so like a before-and-after advertisement. Before he began the exercises, he was very uptight, with sore muscles and a repressive body pose. Afterward, he was like some happy rag doll. Seth began to comment on this in the beginning of the next session. As usual, he used our personal experience as a basis for some excellent information with great general application.

Very good, if you are referring to the hypnosis session. Your condition following this and your first exercise bout should show you how badly you were in need of the treatment. When I suggested that you dissociate, incidentally, I didn’t mean that you should break up into pieces. …

At times, the ego can hold you in a tight vice, which the dissociation breaks. This is what happened after your exercises. You have been doing very well … in allowing yourself psychic freedom. However, conscious fears cause the ego to tighten its grasp, and some effects of this nature were starting up. This is why I suggested the exercises at this time.

If you remember what you know of the trance state — in a light trance, you are able to maintain awareness of self, your environment and your place in it. You simply behave somewhat differently, not bestirring yourself in any direction unless the suggestion to do so has been given. The awareness of plant life lies along these lines.

Now, in a deep trance the subject, though fully aware of what is happening in the trance, may remember nothing of it afterward. The awareness of plant life is also somewhat like that of the subject in deep trance. Except for the suggestion and stimulus received by regular natural forces on your plane, the plant life does not bestir itself in other directions. But like the trance subject, our plant is aware. Its other abilities lie unused for the time, and latent, but they are present.