“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(They had to do with my painting, my lack of financial contributions this year, etc. Jane cried while telling me about them, and while we used the pendulum. They also have to do with her teeth and jaw symptoms, and fear of eating recently, we’ve learned.)

(A few notes: I have always felt that my early life, being so different than Jane’s, had a lot to do with my approach to painting, once I embarked upon it after meeting her when I was about 34. I didn’t grow up with the consuming urge toward fine art that she developed about writing at an early age. I did commercial work for many years. I have always taken these differences for granted, and evidently assumed too much when I thought she understood them.

(Further, my urge toward doing my best work comes at an age when I feel that I should be doing my best work. When I started painting, I was appalled to discover my ignorance. I’ve spent years trying to learn. The urge to learn, perhaps overdone, may be one of the Nebene characteristics, [and as an aside I thoroughly wish the Nebene character did not exist.] But regardless of that, I didn’t think my wish to excel in my chosen field necessarily a poor one. I was willing to spend the time necessary to master painting. Each one has been a trial. The last year has been very productive as far as learning goes, and I’m at the point where I expect it to begin paying rich dividends. It also seems that this point coincides with a time of trial for Jane and me, as witness these deleted sessions.

(I have for some time thought that Jane needed to sell her writings as a means of justifying her life—whether these writings were her best work was, in that sense, immaterial; she couldn’t possibly wait until her writing was a polished art before beginning to market it. So I don’t believe comparisons between her selling her work, and me selling mine, mean much. I also have an attitude that is quite personal, whether it is a good one or not: I don’t care too much what others think about my painting. Oddly enough, I am sure that my work will end up very successful, both as art and in the marketplace. So I can safely say that in my own way I am trying very hard to make a “success” of my work. Our methods differ markedly, however.

(I do believe that I haven’t made enough of an effort to inform Jane of feelings and goals of mine that I seem to have taken for granted. I can only say that I thought she knew them, or many of them. They aren’t all that mysterious. I hope I live in this reality long enough to get a few years’ mileage out of what I think I have learned.

(A thought: I now realize that Jane put the same interpretation on her own work—namely, the psychic work. It took me years to learn that she regarded her work in the psychic field—and the time and energy involved—as aside from her main creative goal, which is to write “straight” literature that is also art.)

(I told Jane after this session that I’d intended to leave the job in a year or so —in other words, at about this time, rather than when I did. I thought that by now we’d have a good financial backlog built up, and freedom of action. I didn’t realize last year of course that she was so dissatisfied with the psychic image and the books; I blithely assumed that she felt she was doing good work, and that she accepted it, which doesn’t mean that I had any thoughts of ever saying she shouldn’t do any other kind of writing, ever. I had no idea of the bitterness or the depths of her resistance to, or feeling against, being sidetracked, as she sees it, from her main goals in life.)

(11:26. I asked Seth for a break, but this proved to be the end of the session. Both of us were upset, of course. I told Jane that I had been having a change of mind, and that perhaps she shouldn’t contract Seth’s latest book in advance after all. I had become afraid a contract would reinforce the emphasis on psychic work that she wants to get out from under. I told her I would go along with whatever she decided on the contract, but did express my thoughts on it.

(I said I was willing to face whatever developed because of this action—that if I had to get a job on part-time basis, okay. After all, we do have money; money also is due from her father’s estate, royalties, Rich Bed eventually, and the sale of paperback rights by Prentice-Hall; ESP class also helps—Jane said she enjoys the class. I don’t see her symptoms lessening, so feel that action must be taken.

(Ideas of self-respect, or its lack, have never meant a thing to me... I am free of such burdens. When I left my job I thought it would please Jane, and of course I was glad to see it go, although I would have waited longer on my own. I must admit I don’t understand why each thing we do seems to make matters worse. What is left in our lives to learn, to uncover? What do other people do? I pity them, I guess.)