“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Ruburt’s feelings of physical mobility are to some extent connected with his feelings of creative mobility—that is, the connections are strong.

As far as dilemmas go, he feels one as far as Prentice is concerned, since he sees Prentice as a vehicle (underlined) that moves his work out into the public arena, and he feels that that vehicle is at best presently stalled, while no other one is in immediate practical sight.

Both the change in Tam’s position, and changes that take place in the company contributed, along with your own strong dissatisfactions with Prentice to begin with. Creatively, on that level alone, he also feels stalled, since he does not know whether or not to continue with my book, or whether or not to begin one of his own—so you have a stalled mobility, without any particular decisions being made of a clear-cut nature.

In that kind of period, he is more apt to be dissatisfied, brood about his physical condition, and therefore aggravate his symptoms. They are, however, the exterior picture of the inner one—to go ahead or to retreat. To go ahead in what direction? Instead the situation is a stalled one.

In the background there is of course his reaction to the two books. Some of that material I have given. (Long pause.) Some is difficult to explain clearly, because Ruburt wanted to make sure of the validity of the sessions from the start, and because of other material given in the past, he did not fully accept the sessions or his own psychic abilities as an integral part of his personality—since they appeared relatively late in life, where the poetry, for example, had always more or less been apparent.

(9:02.) He felt a strong commitment to poetry and writing. He could not early accept the idea of having a mission in life outside of the simple one to write, which always propelled him. He examined the sessions thoroughly then for years, not feeling the same kind of self-assurance as he did, you see, with his “own” writing.

His own writing underwent its own kinds of transformation, however, and indeed it began those translations years ago, even before the sessions, so that for example even the science fiction could no longer contain or camouflage the larger intuitive framework that he was developing.

(Long pause.) I have remarked before that part of the problem lies in discrepancies of growth. You spoke (today) of some artists painting formula paintings. For Ruburt to try to publish usual novels, for example, would not work: he has outgrown the formulas. At the same time, for many reasons there has been a difficulty in accepting the natural patterns of his own individualistic growth—and that is partially because there were no neat categories in which they seemed to naturally fall. So in searching out new ways, personally and creatively, Ruburt felt himself on insecure ground.

That insecurity has largely prevented him from fully using his own abilities on his own behalf (intently). He is gifted precisely with the kind of abilities that can clear up all of his problems. Fears, however, have prevented him from fully trusting—or consistently trying—such avenues, not only fears, but the batteries of past beliefs, both on his part and yours, with their unfortunate patterns of behavior and conditioned responses. It is sometimes difficult for me to translate what I know about the situation into terms that you can accept jointly, because of the press of those beliefs and the accompanying habitual behavior and conditioning.

(“Why has he responded to his feeling—how did you put it?” I asked as I rummaged through the session’s earlier pages, which I’d thrown on the floor beside the chair—“stalled, by giving up his physical mobility even more so now? I’m terribly concerned about all of this. I don’t understand why he can’t walk inside his own house, at least, where it’s safe. The whole thing has become very threatening.”

(9:46.) The closest answer I can give you, I thought, was clear in tonight’s session, but to clear it further: (Long pause.) He believed that his motion was blocked, that belief was physically expressed. It was to bring the situation out into the open, as indeed the feelings of panic also served to make him consciously aware of the difficulty—a difficulty that basically has to do with psychological motion and growth.

(Seth paused, so I asked: “But what does he think he’s doing? Why carry anything to such lengths? I’m not asking for a perfect performance, and I couldn’t deliver one myself, but it’s extreme behavior on his part when he can’t walk across the goddam room—”)

Each personality is in a state of his own growth and development, and you cannot impose any standard demands upon such a process, however tempting it is to do so.

(“But I don’t think asking him to be able to walk is a standard demand,” I said. “What good does his giving up his physical mobility do? There must be many other ways of calling attention to any problems than doing that.”

Have Ruburt make one simple request, and no other, before sleep: that he receive therapeutic healing experiences at all levels of his existence as he sleeps, beginning this evening. End of session.

(“Well, I know I’m right.” I said. “I’ve seen the same situation come up many times in the past, and let it go, but we can’t do that now....” And I didn’t even get to mention the doctor-hospital option to Seth. I did tell Jane I understood what Frank Longwell was doing, and appreciated his efforts to help, so generously given. But I added that FL could massage her legs “till doomsday,” and it would do little good until we came to terms with the basic causes behind the symptoms.