“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

The confidence that Ruburt receives in such circumstances is of great help to us all. We shall have a relaxed session this evening. There are several points however that I would like to make. They have to do with our discussion of time in general.

The ego as you know it, the conscious self within your time system, this ego, let us say, arrives at and experiences event X.

(This is the first time in many sessions that Willy has paid any attention to Jane during a session. In the early sessions he exhibited some drastic behavior at Seth’s presence and/or arrival. At times he would attempt to entangle himself in Jane’s legs as she paced about the room while speaking for Seth. At other times he seemed to exhibit plain panic, running to hide just before session time. Seth told us this was because the cat’s very acute senses detected his arrival on our plane. Willy, he said, would get used to his presence eventually and show no reaction; this has been the case now for well over a year.)

As I have explained the ego to you, within your system it can only perceive in terms of continuity, in a straight-line fashion so to speak, one event after the other. It can only choose to experience one event out of all the probable events at a time. The ego is however the only portion of the self that is, in the main, limited to follow experience along these lines.

Since your physical time operates as it does, the physical organism does not have time within its own framework to experience any more than one probable event. It cannot focus upon two events at once. It goes without saying, again, that we are simplifying matters considerably, since each physical event is actually a gestalt of many small events.

The ego must choose one of all these because of its physical time limitations. But this other portion of the self can, and does, delve into what you could call event X1, X2, X3, et cetera. It can pursue and experience all of these alternate events, and it can do so in the same amount of physical time that it takes for the ego to experience event X alone.

These actions exist nevertheless. It does not take you time to perceive them one by one. You perceive them in their completed fashion. Now this other portion of the self experiences these probable events, consciously, with as much rapidity as you subconsciously perceive the million small actions that make up the handshake.

The imagination can vaguely perceive, of course, some probabilities, but the physical organism can directly experience but one of these within physical time, and in terms of continuity. The probable events however are precisely as real as that one event which is chosen from them to be a physical experience. And these events therefore become “real”, in quotes, within other dimensions. As a sideline here, there are some interesting episodes, not at all understood, when a severe psychological shock, or even a deep sense of unendurable futility, will cause a short circuit, so to speak, so that one portion of the self becomes aware, and begins to experience reality as it exists for another portion of the self.

In some such cases the individual is experiencing a probable event. But he must experience it, you see, within his own time system.

(Break at 10:00. Jane had been dissociated as usual. Her eyes had been open much of the time. Her delivery had been rather fast and emphatic, she had smiled often, used many gestures, and smoked a couple of cigarettes.

(It was now time for the 34th Dr. Instream test. Jane sat quietly with her head down and her hands raised to her closed eyes. She spoke now with many rather short pauses. She was not smoking. Resume at 10:05.)

(End at 10:22 Jane was dissociated as usual. Her delivery picked up a little toward the end, and her eyes opened a few times. She said Seth was pleased when I said thank you.

(Wednesday and Thursday nights, January 19 & 20, Jane gave herself suggestions that she would have a great abundance of energy. She usually uses suggestion each night, but this time she wanted a little something extra.

(On Wednesday, January 26, she wrote 7 poems in 2 1/2 hours. This time span included doing some other work on the book also.