“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

You have taken it, subconsciously now, as a personal failure that you are not farther ahead, not only financially but in terms of the amount of power you would like to hold. You would like to kick out, but you feel you have lost your footing, hence the symptoms in the feet.

This was reflected in other portions of the body as well. As you noted, you felt off balance subjectively, and unsure. Now. You had grown used to smoking as a way of comforting yourself. You removed the comfort. You refused to add another, and at the same time you did not face the inner problem that was bothering you, that made the comfort so necessary to begin with. We will go into this more deeply, for you can indeed rid yourself of the symptoms, but I would like to make one point here first. When you bought the dog, subconsciously you felt that the dog was almost a symbol of your failure.

She knew subconsciously that you would consider that a failure. We will have much more to say. In the meantime take your break, but (smiling) keep yourself together.

The family all knew, subconsciously again, that the dog had to go. Everyone was overly nice to the dog, so no one would know consciously, what they knew subconsciously—that you considered the dog the symbol of failure. It was a closely guarded secret by all, hidden, but not entirely, from the conscious minds of those involved. No one wanted the dog killed, but it was not coincidence that you yourself loosened the dog’s collar, or that your wife was the one who left the dog; for symbolically the two of you were connected here. Now give us a moment. The act itself was symbolic, and the dog picked up all of your attitudes through its own sense of communication.

In the first place none of you would have found it comfortable in the long run, to live with an animal that you considered the symbol for failure. Now I will give you time for questions. Let us follow this through.

The failure was being rejected, you see. Now the dog was a hunting dog. Symbolically you have always equated hunting with a man’s work in modern society. That was one connection. You would not feel free to hunt successfully with the animal, for he was, you felt, the symbol of an unsuccessful hunt in the work world.

Each member of the family picked this up. The dog had to be loved. It was a face-saving gesture. No one wanted you to know, and all of this now on a subconscious basis. Under the conditions that were then in operation, and underline that, for you all to have accepted the dog for any length of time would have been an admission and acceptance of failure.

You have been concentrating emotionally, and at a certain level, upon failure. Now you translate activity into many areas. You have been frightened of your mother’s disease, and you have also translated a fear of inactivity into other than physical realms.

To protect yourself from her disease you had to move quickly physically. You also had to move quickly in the area of work. You were sensitized because of your mother’s problem to fear inactivity. Any threat to your motion or advance, even in the business area, becomes highly charged for this reason. Earlier you felt that you could strike out. There was plenty of time. Then you became frightened after the age of 35, and you began to soften up your blows. (Jane gestured widely, with a fist.) You began to hold back, become more cautious, and then slowly began to entertain thoughts of the possibility of failure.

Now I am speaking of failure as it would apply to you, in your estimation. All of these attitudes were reflected in the body.

Tell yourself several times a day that you can deal with whatever problems you have. Do not keep thinking of the job situation so that you are hammering yourself over the head with it constantly. Whenever you find yourself projecting failure in any sense into the future, even into tomorrow, stop yourself, remind yourself that your thoughts form reality.