“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

You identified with your father because he seemed free, in that she did not direct actively these strong affections toward him. To be like him then represented safety, for she did not like failures.

She was an activist, so you tried to become the opposite. Now then: on the one hand you attempted to be virile by identifying with your father, yet he was also to you the symbol of a failure. To be a failure therefore was virile (as my pendulum told me).

Any push toward success became a threat to your virility; a push from a woman became to you a double threat to your virility. You felt as if she threatened to castrate you. Ruburt has been aware of this. This is one of the main reasons that he suffers from strong feelings of disloyalty whenever he allows himself to wish that you were more successful in your work, artistically or financially.

He fears that you will interpret this as a threat of castration. Because of his own background you knew that he would not push you in this respect. He has an innate talent for making money, that has not been developed nor used for these reasons; and all suggestions made by him to you have been regarded by you as threats, and he felt that the suggestions were mistakes on his part. (One minute please.)

(Long pause.) Ruburt has been adding to the strength of the negative influences of his past. The more he reacts to them the more thoroughly he convinces himself of their strength. His background was unfortunate. It was not as unfortunate as he supposes. Many of his most redeeming qualities and characteristics were formed by it.

His vitality was formed in that environment. The passive qualities in him would have been far more predominant, overly so, but for the adversity he faced. His mother’s colorful, emphatic and mystical characteristics gave him incentive, and generated mental and psychic activity. (Long pause.)

She was highly imaginative. At times she did not know fantasy from reality. Ruburt was literal-minded in many respects. He took her hysterical and desperate threats literally, when many children would not have done so. The background of Ruburt’s personality was unfortunate, and fortunate.

The overall self chose the background. Now. Ruburt has always been primarily driven by a desire to write successfully. His mother encouraged the writing. At the same time he felt guilty that he was free and the mother was not, and he blamed himself to some degree for her situation. The mother did blame the child in this respect.

Financial success was put off, you see. It was not to be denied but put off. (Pause.) He did not want to share it with his mother, for to Ruburt this meant having his mother live with him.

Now these feelings served to put success off. They were not strong enough to deny it entirely, and he was working through them, although this took considerable energy.

These hidden feelings however made him susceptible to your own fears. He must indeed, completely, rid himself of his strong resentments at his mother. The above paragraphs should help him. He cannot resent the environment nor his parent, since he chose both. (Long pause.)

We will fill all of this in for you. If some of it seems disconnected it is simply because I want to outline the main areas to be developed. Ruburt saw himself as a writer, and not as a psychic. He knew intuitively that he was a psychic. He was also highly anxious to succeed, and knew that he was not doing so.

The psychic abilities appeared precisely when he needed an extra drive toward success, and a way toward success that would not be instantly recognized as such.

His own past fears of success were finally set aside with the acceptance of the ESP book. Not so much set aside as driven back. He saw instantly that you resented the publication of the book, as he had seen earlier that you resented the publication of The Rebellers. You resented that book very much.

(Jane nodded yes. Pause, eyes closed. She held a hand up.) He was frightened then at your reaction. It was this fright that prevented him from finishing all of those projects he began, or from selling them.

You both became involved in the psychic work. He felt therefore that you would feel his success was yours also. He thought at that time that you were simply jealous of him. Your reaction to the ESP book quite literally terrified him. He then realized that you did not want either of you to be successful.

Some was, but when it became conscious he became panic-stricken. His drive toward success had been quickened by its taste, however. He wanted more. He felt hampered by you. At the same time he felt the need to contribute financially, and he felt that you were tying his hands by forcing him to make money in ways in which he was not particularly equipped to do so, while forbidding him to be a success with books.

The dream book was an attempt to try again, a desperate attempt for independence on his part to succeed in spite of the negative influences. (Pause.) He felt that you rejected it as a whole, and completely. His impatience and panic did impede his judgment, causing him to send it out too early, and for this he blamed you.

The book became a sore point, and the focus in his work of the inner problem, a symbol. Finally he had to force himself to work on it, and at times he could not work on it. There was an inner refusal to make concessions. You both maintained your positions, and would not communicate.

His symptoms represented his problem. He felt literally paralyzed, and unable to move. Now he can move, but he still cannot run, you see. He moves much better. He is partially released but far from fully.

At the crisis point you were both alienated. He was completely bewildered. He was doing what he felt you wanted him to do, yet the results displeased you, and he felt you found him physically repulsive. In desperation you both began to question inner attitudes, and you then broke the ice with a pendulum session. (See the 350th Session.)

(“Well, I guess I do. He wears a hat, and I stick to caps...There must be something here I’m missing, though.”)

He has worn caps much like the one you wear, and for many years they hung in the back porchway. This is an unconscious item of identification that you have donned.

Another note: Ruburt’s letters, business letters. He allowed you to take spontaneity and friendliness from them. (Pause.)

Now all of this affected our sessions. My ability to help is determined by many issues. Ruburt’s overall condition has to some extent impeded us, (pause) and because of a distrust of his own abilities he will sometimes doubt my legitimacy. Such doubts then impeding his progress and limiting what help I have to offer. (Pause.)

His distrust of his abilities was partially a result of the basic conflict, and if he could not trust himself how could he trust me when I spoke through him?