“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(This afternoon Jim Tennant, who was scheduled to be a witness tonight, called Jane at the gallery and told her he would be unable to attend the session because his wife is in the hospital.

(By 8:55 Jane was nervous as usual; she also had something of a kink in her neck, though to a minor degree. It was a pleasant spring evening, although traffic noise was loud through the open windows. Jane began dictating in a rather normal voice; she paced at a moderate speed and her eyes darkened as usual.)

(Break at 9:27. Jane was quite dissociated for a first delivery, she said. Seth came through well. When she is dissociated Jane said she does not worry about distortions in the material. She also realized that the bothersome kink had disappeared from her neck. The combination, psychio-physical was not familiar to her.

(Break at 10:02. Jane was fully dissociated—way out, she said. She could feel Seth trying to make her use certain phrases rather than others, in order to make the material as clear as possible. She also had a vague idea of the general direction in which the material was headed.

(By now, Jane was again delivering the material at a very slow and deliberate pace.)

(Later, Jane told me that as she was delivering this material aloud, she also contained within another parallel channel of thought from Seth, as she often does. This time she was quite aware of Seth’s concern lest anyone, upon reading this section of the material, commit suicide in a misguided effort to prove that it is possible for the consciousness to get along without the physical body. Jane said that at times she is aware of as many as three separate, parallel streams of thought, at the same time as she is giving voice to one of them.)

(Break at 10:44. Jane was much more dissociated than usual. Her neck felt fine, she said. The whole session, which she feels to be exceptionally good, has been like a dream to her. My right hand felt somewhat cramped after the above delivery, although in recent sessions it has been much better.

(Jane also announced that at various times during the past two or three weeks, she had had the feeling of her left foot or hand—never the right—being plunged in hot water. It is not a feeling of perspiration, but more like a hot flash. It will happen at any time—at work, at home, etc. It is a feeling almost as though the limb could dissolve or merge into a warm environment that was enveloping it.

(At this moment I heard clearly the crunching banging sound of an automobile accident, through our open windows. Our living-room windows command a good view of our street, one of the main ones in Elmira, but a quick look told me the accident was out of our visual range. Jane heard it too, but merely cast a casual look through a window. As with the burning chicken described in the last session, she paid no attention; during delivery she seems to be largely impervious to distractions.)

(Again, I became aware that my right hand felt enlarged; the feeling had subsided but now returned, and with an increased intensity. It was somewhat of a handicap in writing; the hand, having a different feeling as it held the pen, made me concentrate more on the simple physical act of putting the words down. And I saw Jane rubbing her hands together as she paced back and forth while dictating.)

(The phenomenon persisted in my right hand to a surprising degree. Even the thumb and little finger were now involved. By now of course I was quite sure that this was deliberate upon Seth’s part, considering the subject matter of the material. I still disliked interrupting the material’s flow, however.)

(I was now most interested in taking some measurements from both Jane and myself while our hands felt this way, as Bill Macdonnel had helped me do in the 47th session, when we found definite physical evidence of finger enlargement. Not being able to do this at the moment however, I did recall Seth’s very definite statements in the 49th session, page 63, concerning his most conservative attitude toward demonstrations.)

(My hand phenomenon still persisted, and now involved the left as well. As far as duration was concerned, this experience of course far exceeded any previous one.)

(End at 11:31. Jane was fully dissociated; way out, she said, with no memory of her surroundings while delivering the material. Yet she knew the session had been one of the best yet.

(Far from diminishing, my hand phenomenon was now at its peak. So was Jane’s. The third finger of my right hand seemed to enlarge even more. Jane looked for our scissors; since we were unprepared it took a few minutes to find them and cut some narrow strips of paper. These strips I used as tapes to measure the circumferences of the third finger on both of our right hands. I measured Jane’s above the middle knuckle, and mine above and below the same knuckle.

(At 11:35 Jane’s measurement was 2 ”. The following night, 5/21, the same finger measured 2 ¼” at the same spot, for a difference in circumference of ”.

(And again, I was aware that in spite of all the writing I had done for the session, my hand did not feel cramped or too tired.)

(Self- Sunday 5/24, 9:45 PM: We had spent the day driving about the countryside. Now in the desired state I had several short experiences where I was gliding along different highways, up and down hills, around curves, etc. Do not recall being in a car, or that Jane was with me. Very pleasant.

(Then came a rather unpleasant experience. Driving or gliding along river road just north of Chemung NY, with fence on my right so that I could not get off the road, I saw sweeping down the hill some distance ahead of me a big tractor-trailer truck—on the wrong side of the road. This experience had duration enough for me to consider the best way to avoid it. It did not swerve about, merely headed straight for me until it loomed up enormously right in front of me. There was no crash but I was frightened; part of the time I saw the truck through a veil of white. Then I realized I had plenty of room to pull off the road to the left, and so would be safe.

(Also, again tuned in on part of a conversation between Mother and Father; heard it clearly, and was involved in it, I believe, yet could not retain it and forgot it upon getting up, until the next day. Don’t recall seeing them this time though.

(Jane- Saturday, 5/23 3:30 AM: Jane saw two hands, shiny like a sick person’s, in a white light. The image was so clear she thought her eyes were open. When she did open them she came out of the desired state.)