“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

When we have a suitable period of time it would be most beneficial for us to discuss the various members of your present family, Joseph, in connection with their past experiences.

(Here Jane’s voice began to deepen and grow a bit louder. Jane knows rather little about my family history. Seth is correct in stating that my father’s older brother, my Uncle Jay, who is also dead, was connected with Ella in this life; he was very protective toward her, and after he died eight years ago his wife continued to watch over Ella.

You must also realize that the entity who became her son also chose the circumstances, knowing of them in advance, for his own purposes. There are many character aspects to be considered here. For if each personality is an energy gestalt, then also each family group is also an energy gestalt. The actions and interactions form its characteristics and nature.

Your Ella, then, reacted against the repressed violence which has always been a part of that family structure as it is composed of its various personalities. She reacted vehemently against this repressed violence. She married a man in whom there was little aggressiveness.

To some extent she resembled her mother. Her vanity, however, was not a characteristic woman’s vanity. Her vanity was perhaps the one characteristic that she shared with other members of the family. She felt she was set apart, but also that she was set apart because she could not tolerate violence. Violence frightened her deeply.

(As stated before, Jane met Ella twice, both times rather briefly some years ago, and has no idea how much she remembers of the visits subconsciously. Jane met Ella’s husband Wilbur once; he died a few years ago. I remember Wilbur as a small gentle man who was a tailor and who smoked strong cigars. He had a white mustache and a gravel voice. I recall that the family accused him of drinking heavily and of not taking care of Ella, although I recall no objective evidence of this. I always liked Wilbur. After his death Ella was moved to a nursing home.

(For some data on my parents and our family group, see the following sessions: 17, 18, 21, 27, 53, 93, 94, 172, among others, in Volumes 1 through 4.

Originally, she collected the buttons to help him in his business. His family was large and scattered. He took great pains in his work, but he was also frightened; and the world confused him and he chattered, again like a squirrel. But they were very free in their own way, and your father’s family never forgave them for this freedom.

This desire for freedom from worldly concerns is a characteristic in your family on your father’s side. It has not been given any creative fulfillment except in your own case, for they have been thinking in terms of freedom from rather than freedom for. They did not have anything that they wanted to do with the freedom, but only escape. So your one brother with his [model] trains, and the other brother with his golf. The outlets are extremely necessary to them.

(Alice is a cousin to my family although we barely know her. Ella was greatly attached to her, I believe, and the two women spent some time together in the same rest home. Alice was a missionary in Korea for many years. She left the home where Ella was staying a year before Ella’s death. At the funeral Sunday we heard that Alice, at 80-odd years, was still alive, traveling about the country at the moment in connection with the sale of some property.)

Another point I wanted to mention. Your father told himself that your mother, as a young woman, was sensitive and intelligent because she was beautiful. You can reread the earlier material given on your family’s past lives, and you will see further involvements.