“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(Today Jane received an answer to her letter of March 11/64 to the American Society for Psychical Research. A scientist there wondered if Seth could describe him or one of his associates. Jane and I both felt that Seth would not comply, at least at this time. We based this opinion on material already received.

(Jane felt so “unalert” tonight that first she took a nap after supper, then went for a walk at 8:15. By 8:45 she said she had no idea of Seth’s material for tonight, and that this made her nervous. I thought she acted well, though she said she was tired. In fact, after the session she felt better than before it began.

(Jane’s pacing was by now quite fast. For someone who was tired to begin with, she was setting quite a pace.)

(“Jane said something about that today.”

(Jane had done well today, working alone with the ESP cards. She said that she usually could tell, somehow, when she was having a good run, before results were checked.)

(Break at 9:27. Jane was only moderately dissociated. She still felt tired, she said, but at least no worse. When she began dictating again her voice was a little louder. She kept up her rather fast pacing. Resume at 9:31.)

(The rather peculiar use of the word enable in the above paragraph is evidently just the word Seth wanted to use. I asked Jane to repeat it, to make sure I had it right the first time, and she very definitely pronounced that word.)

(Break at 10:01. Jane said she was more dissociated this time. She also felt better. However I had to ask her to repeat several phrases, and thought she was tired. I felt somewhat that way also; indeed, we have often wondered whether I too am in a light trance while Seth is around. At times I have been aware of a feeling very similar to the pleasant, easygoing state I first became acquainted with when Jane hypnotized me.

(Jane picked up her fast pace again, and began dictation in a firm, precise voice. Resume at 10:06.)

(“Like the time Jane and I created those images at York Beach?”)

(Break at 10:27. Jane was dissociated as usual. She said that she now felt much better but that it was up to her, she could end the session whenever she wanted to. Seth’s reference to open windows came because Jane had opened a window during last break when the room got stuffy from cigarette smoke. Resume at 10:35.)

(Our doctor friend, last week, had half-jokingly suggested Jane and I see what Seth would have to say about the market. Jane and I were so sure Seth would turn thumbs down on the idea that we had not asked the question.)

(End at 11:00. Jane was dissociated as usual. She said that by now she felt much better than when she began the session, and that ordinarily she would have felt worse, considering all the walking she had been doing, etc.)

(Re Jane’s sensation. This material is included here because it is dealt with briefly by Seth in the following session, the 39th.

(The 39th Session, March 30/64, Monday, found us both very tired, so tired that we did not actually want to hold it. Our routine had been changed by my taking a part-time job which necessitated our rising at an earlier hour. Since I paint in the afternoons, and Jane works out at her job, by nine at night we have already put in a full day. In addition, we had been invited out for supper.

(We were back home by 8 PM; at 8:15 Jane lay down for half an hour, in preparation for the session, while I prepared papers for the notes I would be taking, and read over some previous material from Seth.

(At 8:45 I walked into the living room to call Jane. She lay quietly on the couch, eyes closed, but in a few minutes told me she was awake. She also told me she had been visited by a most strange sensation; and from her description of it I felt sure it must be an exploration of the inner senses, similar to the one I experience occasionally, which Seth has called the feeling of sound. I thought Jane’s description most remarkable.

(Jane told me that upon slowly coming awake from her nap, and while she was listening to me move about the living room setting up the desk and my pad, etc., for the session, she had the most peculiar feeling of “growing larger.” The first laughing phrase she used was that she felt as though she was as big as an elephant.

(When we close our eyes, Jane said, we are aware of a certain “area” of blackness, an area we are used to. Her area while in this state was much enlarged—she used the phrase infinitely large to describe it. She was not aware of too much happening within this area, she said, just that it existed. Had she known more about it, we felt she might have understood more that would be going on in this extended black area. She was not frightened by the sensation, and went along with it.

(Jane said it was as though her eyes had actually moved farther apart, to create this expanded, broadened field of awareness, of infinite black. When she opened her eyes she felt a light snapping sensation that was very gentle, and not audible. She did not have the sensation when her eyes were open; but she said the physical sensation of this experience was so strong there could be no doubt of it.

(It will be remembered that my first sensation episode, of February 8/64 [See page 172], jogged my memory so that I was able to recall a previous such experience of perhaps a year ago. In like manner Jane’s experience reminded her that on two previous occasions she had experienced forerunners of this evening’s sensation.