“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

You cannot step outside it for a better view. (Humorously.) It is easier to realize that the vision and the everalive energy is far more permanent than the forms. The permanency and the timeless quality do not belong to the shapes of the mountains and the trees, but to the conscious energy that forms them.

Pretend that the energy within that object is the center of life, so that the whole rest of the universe derives its energy within that stone or flower. Do this until you can feel that energy pulsate within the form of the object, so that the form itself is ever mobile while it retains the semblance, as in a stone, of immobility.

Now the suggestion I have given you is the same sort of thing. There is no dependence upon agreed ritualistic symbol, however. The exercise itself will allow you to make the necessary transformation, where the one becomes all. Now this is the expansion of which I am speaking. It will cause immediate physical evocative reactions. Do you follow me here?

Now again, much of this has to do with your own interest. Opaques are excellent to suggest a heavy or dark mood. In portraits, while the inner skeletal structure must be hinted at, and while the figure should be well done, still there should be the suggestion of the personality going beyond the image, and of the personality’s energy radiating outward.

In a portrait, do the same exercise as given earlier. Imagine the individual as the center of all life, so that when the painting is completed it automatically suggests the whole universe of which the individual is part. Nothing exists in isolation, and this is the secret that the old masters knew so well.

To use your talents, and they are considerable, you can do no less. Are you tired?

You may do as you like, break or continue. Ruburt and I are fine.

An apple can do more in a painting than stand before the spirit of all apples, though that is an accomplishment. An apple can imply, through use of the exercise I have given you, the whole unseen universe, though not another object is shown in the painting itself.

Now. One of the attractions for others in that painting of me is that it automatically suggests an unseen audience, to whom I appear to be speaking. Not indeed a formal audience, but unseen listeners who represent humanity at large. The unseen is there. ‘The figure manages to suggest the universe of men and the world that holds them, yet nowhere literally do these appear.

The skin of the apple must also give the feeling that it is more than an enclosure, for through it energy from the sun also comes. While it seems solid it is open, and connected with the rest of the universe. An apple in a room goes out into that room. Do you see?

(Another long pause. I asked finally: “Why don’t you open your eyes?” But Jane did not do so, and gestured to me to wait. Resume at 10:11.)

(Again Jane paused, at 10:13. This time she told me I had better speak her name three times, as Seth had suggested I do in a recent session, when her trance was deep. I did so now, and very slowly Jane opened her eyes, one at a time, on a crack. But, as she said later, she never really got out of the trance, and resumed at 10:15.)

This has something to do with Ruburt’s difficulty in breaking the trance state. (Pause.) From someone else here… Your figures, to get the feeling of depth and breadth, this is not to get the feeling simply of the flesh and bone within the flesh, but to suggest the personal energy and vitality that is in a riot, to be loose within the flesh.

Having to do with him. (Pause, head down, hair disheveled.) Now as the clouds’ construction constantly changes—tonight you watched them (and sketched them after supper) so the forms of objects constantly change. (Pause, head down, hair disheveled. Eyes closed. Jane constantly rubbed her face and eyes with both hands.) We had better get Ruburt out of this for now, at least for a break. Touch his shoulder.

(The Van Elder name was not specifically familiar to me, although it could be said to have a familiar sound. I can say that the painting and energy data given tonight is entirely sound and worthy, however, and certainly beneficial for any artist. The method of using siennas, ochre and violet is not one I have used, but appears to be quite sensible; I may try it soon. I do not believe Jane consciously thinks this way.