“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(“Good evening, Seth. Well, do you want to continue where you left off last time?”)

Besides normal reasons (Jane dictates:) he was psychically inclined, at a time when Jane was young and herself close to a past life. She sensed his deep and personal inner awareness. It confused and haunted him, since his inarticulateness applied also to thoughts within himself. He felt strongly but could not explain. In his solitary nature he came close to being a mystic but he was unable to relate his personality as Joseph Burdo with the social world at large, or even to the other members of his family. There was a block, regrettably. He felt strongly his connection with the universe as a whole and with nature as he understood it. But to him nature did not include his fellow human beings. The solitariness that besieged him—because it did besiege him—is dangerous to any personality unless it comes after identification with the human race.

It was an unfortunate defect in the personality. The psychic nature grew in an oddly distorted manner in some aspects and yet remained stubbornly shrunken in others. From early age however Jane drank in his feeling of completeness with nature, and it had much to do with her later development. She now displays in some instances her grandfather’s closed attitude toward people. At times both you and Jane reinforce each other along these lines.

Such relationships, disciplined of course, will nevertheless yield richness for both of you that neither of you would get in any other manner. You do not have to take hordes into your house. On the other hand all stages of relationships are necessary, and a casual give and take between you and friends will expand your spirit in ways that neither you nor Jane personally can do alone. I am going into this matter because it has concerned both of you at various times, and I would like to state that your work will not suffer by expending energy in these other directions.

The time element is something I told you I would discuss, and if my intentions are strong Ruburt at this point is growing weak. And there is a certain element of time in this statement. The material itself has not made either of you weary. Time involved, or your idea of the time involved, has.

On your plane no action is really simultaneous and so time instantly enters in. You mentioned yourself Joseph—oh see, you can’t hide anything from me—you mentioned earlier—I’m sorry, Ruburt needs a short break. A short one, Ruburt, should suffice.

To some extent though to a much lesser degree you can do this on your own plane, but in a weak fraction of a dimension. That is, you can perhaps sense or remember an earlier moment intuitively or capture an earlier moment visually as in a photograph, or audibly as in a recording. You can through motion pictures refer back to past time, capturing the visual and auditory data of a moment and even the apparent motion of its sequence. Viewing through your so marvelous television—ha—a historical moment for example you can refer to much that has passed.

But this referral itself involves time. The time that you spend watching such a historic moment takes up an identical amount of time in the present. Therefore one minute of such a past referral costs you one minute of present time. Also you end up short-changed. You give up your precious moment in the present but you do not have a complete moment of the past to show for it.

When I refer back to myself or back to what I have said in an earlier session, I do not expend an identical amount of time in doing so. That is, if two hours of your time were necessary for me to give you certain material it does not take me the same amount of time to refer back to the whole body of the same material.

While I am not affected by time on your plane I am affected by something resembling time on my plane. Time has no meaning without barriers. To put it another way, time has no meaning without the necessity to counteract against other actions.

Basically this is a gem of a description, if I do say so myself. The sad part is that you probably won’t be able to understand it. It all takes time! As I try to counteract your ignorance I couldn’t resist. I mean it kindly, you have no idea of the difficulties involved in explaining time to someone who must take time to try and understand the explanation.

The study of time will teach you much about fifth dimension also. Our imaginary wires composed of solidified vitality are fluid, I hope you understand this, even while they are solidified. For solidity is only illusion.

I have said also that this feeling of vitality, and I prefer the term vitality, is moving and itself a part of the living stuff of the universe. Now as these wires pass seemingly from plane to plane they actually form the boundaries of each plane and become subject to the particular laws of the plane. Therefore they become subject to time on your plane. And they become subject to other laws, if not laws of time, on other planes.

The motion of the apparently solidified vitality gives the illusion of time. The counteraction involved in this case is counteraction within the core of vitality itself, in much the same manner that we spoke of a closed mental enclosure, multiplying and setting up motion within itself.

The action and counteraction is the time trigger. To you this will be almost unbelievable, but on some other planes motion is simultaneous and time unknown. To me time can be manipulated, used at leisure and examined. To me your time is a vehicle, one of the several vehicles by which I can enter your awareness. It is therefore still a reality of some kind to me. Otherwise I could not utilize it in any manner whatsoever. As an example of my good intentions I will end this session.

In any case I shall say good night. You should know that I too enjoy a moment of social discourse or I would not keep you so long. I regret the necessity to keep Joseph so occupied. However I try to speak to you, Joseph, and answer the questions you would ask if you had the time to open your mouth.

I realize that you both are tired. I enjoy speaking with you and wanted merely a few moments of what you might be pleased to call normal conversation. Friends do not always talk of high and weighty matters, and at times when we have the energy left over from our philosophical dissertations, then let us now and then indulge in at least some pleasantries.

Feeling acts in many worlds. It is the connective and it strongly connects the three of us. If I sound ponderous it is only because these necessary explanations cannot be given to you in a playful manner. You would discount them. And my dear Joseph, at times I peek in on you between sessions. The twist is a beautifully innocent and wicked contortion that I would enjoy.

I see you both now very clearly and I must say that I approve of what I see. I will try to answer a few questions but let us keep these few moments in a light and pleasant vein. This is something of an experience involving your so-called emotions in these sessions for perhaps the first time.

As a man’s voice I fear Jane will sound rather unmelodious. I do not have the voice of an angel by any means, but neither do I sound like an asexual eunuch, which is all I’ve been able to make her sound like all night. And incidentally, Ruburt, you were a good brother at one time. The so-called male aspect of your personality has always been strong, but by this I mean powerful. Without the loyalty that you are learning as a woman your character had serious defects. And there, I said I would not get into anything serious.

One of the reasons Jane does so well with her male characters—if you insist on notes go ahead—is that she has been a male so many times. She has retained the better male characteristics.

Please don’t ask me to recite poetry again. It was never one of my lines. Ruburt has always been gifted artistically, as you have Joseph. With you, your art talents lay beneath layers of fleshy lust at times. You were exceedingly lecherous in Denmark, and I was not much better.

I didn’t say he wasn’t happy, merely impulsive and in need of friendly reinforcement. Dying as a boy in his last life, the experience of adulthood is new to him this time. The transition into adulthood is easier for people who lived to adulthood the last time.

(Yet for my book I tried crystal gazing, using a round glass vase filled with water. I saw nothing but the usual reflections that could be expected. When Rob finished work in his studio at around nine, I told him about the experiment which was unsuccessful as far as I was concerned. I mentioned that the experiment was fascinating because of the natural effects of reflection, etc., and as far as I know I was myself at this time.

(As nearly as I can recall it was then that I began to feel strange, as if something were going to happen. I put this feeling down to imagination. Almost at once I felt dissociated, drowsy, and sat in the rocker without rocking. My eyelids felt very heavy, my head slumped sideways. I could hardly keep awake but at the same time my senses were extremely acute; I could hear every sound in the house. Rob asked what was wrong. I answered that I felt very odd and unlike myself.

(A few quotes from the three handwritten pages Jane attempted while in the trance state… Most of this writing was extremely small and quite unlike her normal hand. Twice she made determined efforts to write larger; when she did she wrote very large and with much force, and the letters leaned at odd angles and had a stiff feeling to them. She also tried twice to use the typewriter. The first time, at about 10:45 PM, she could not exert enough pressure to use the keys; the second time at about midnight was more successful, but still uneven in pressure and lacking punctuation and capitals.