“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

He was, in a fashion only, sexually ambiguous, his mathematics expressing what he thought of as an acceptable male aspect while the artistic levels in his mind, now, he related to his feminine aspects. So he was to some extent a divided man. His creativity showed itself, however, when he allowed himself to play, when he forgot what he thought he should do, and did what he wanted to do.

(9:00.) I want here to stress the basic playful exercising aspects of creativity. When a child indulges in physical play, it exercises its muscles and its entire body. No one has to tell a child to play, for playing comes naturally. Playful games in childhood, not dictated by teachers or parents, often give clear indications of a child’s abilities and leanings. You can sense by watching a child’s play the future shape that his or her life can most productively take. The child does not consciously exercise his or her legs so that they will be strong, but simply joyfully follows the inner impulse to do so.

Now: creativity is basically a mental proposition, a mental or psychic activity. It is also, like physical exercise, an energizing phenomena, one that expands and extends the mental and psychic properties as surely as physical exercise develops the body’s being. (Pause.) What you are dealing with, then, in creativity is a continuing kind of psychic play, an activity that probes into the nature of inner reality and explores it with as much sheer vitality as that with which the child explores physical reality. The child runs, falls down, skips, spins, climbs, swings, tries out its body in as many ways as possible, and naturally explores the body’s relationship with its environment. Then the child explores the environment itself.

(Pause.) The creative product is a remnant, then, a glowing fragment of a larger sensed whole.

Cézanne, as you know, was not a happy man. He could have been a far better artist still, for if his vision was intense, my dear friend, it was cramped, and it moved within itself in an agony to find a creative release that could never be found in the creative product alone, but in the psyche from which that product emerges.

An artist or writer, believing such selective nonsense, will of course find all of his or her other creative abilities a distraction, a bother, a temptation that is bound to detract from the main genius, rather than add to it, deepen its application, and add an orchestration to its subjective moods that would otherwise be quite lacking (all intently).

Those sketches of his, it seems, do not stand up as creative products as a great sculpture might, but they stand for a truly creative originality in which a consciousness played with internal material, and projected outward many of the material properties that then simply did not exist. Much of his art in those terms did not show, but the art of his consciousness expanded beyond Michelangelo’s.

None of your abilities contradict each other, or oppose each other, or minimize each other, or in any way negate any of your probable accomplishments. They are meant to be creatively stacked, not just to be combined for example in conventional terms, but the abilities naturally are psychically merged. They mean that your own consciousness, as you think of it, has a slant, a potential, a rich combination a peculiar savored blend that is meant to be its own creative brew (very intently).

The creative products are important. They are physical landmarks of psychic and artistic inner journeys, but what you do with your consciousness, how you extend it, is even more important, for as physical play is meant to lead to a future physical body that is mature and fulfilled, so the creative nature of that kind of inner play leads to future extended consciousness, an inner being that is the mature version of an earlier self.

The inner creative man knows, as the child did, that the way will be cleared. There was Miss Bowman, there was art school and so forth—so I want you to remember that inner man. Social beliefs, beliefs from childhood or whatever are (underlined) overlays. They are superficial. They have unfortunate effects only when you do not trust the inner self.

When you do, your behavior is actually self-correcting, and if you understand that you will see that some behavior that appears contradictory is instead quite simply creative corrective activity. When you do not understand that, then you can become bewildered, thinking “Why did such-and-such work last week and not this week?”

Sometimes the advice I give you at any given time is meant to take the place of natural creative corrective behavior that ideally you would have taken on your own, but did not.

If you would try to see your own creative unity, then both your painting and your writing would give greater satisfaction, and become richer—your prose inspired by your imagery, and your painting by your ideas, so that both are sparked, producing not only products but a creative vision that sees reality through an extension that would be the natural art of consciousness, meant to blossom from those abilities.

(9:59.) Think of yourself as a creative consciousness, capable of both a detailed and an extended, both a visual and a thoughtful, merged focus.

Now: Ruburt’s list is an excellent idea, and so is the note on the refrigerator. Remind him to walk at least twice daily, and to add to that when possible. Have him forget his ideas of the exclusive expression of creativity, mental or physical. His body is responding, and very well. Encourage his reception of relaxation. He is also being creative when he is relaxed.

This session should be of excellent use, really, to both of you—and remembering the playful nature of creativity will help Ruburt get back to his book. He does that by forgetting the book, and playing with the ideas that it contains.