“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(“I feel gaps in my consciousness,” Jane said, worried. “I’ll start to do something, then I’ll find myself thinking that I’ve already done it—but that means that I’ve dozed off in the meantime, and didn’t do it at all....”

(At first Jane didn’t know what she wanted to—or could—do. She’s fallen into a regular, very narrow pattern of eating, watching TV, and sleeping, either in her chair or in bed, night and day. She reads a little but writes—or tries to—even less. “I’m scared,” she said again. “That dozing off really worries me....”

(Once again, I tried to get through to her that the sessions or her own work could offer ways to get through that period, or at least offer greater insights into it. “If it was me,” I said, and I probably shouldn’t have, “I couldn’t wait to get something on what’s going on, in the hope that it would help.” Lately I’ve more or less given up bugging her to have sessions, since it seemed that that activity was beyond her means at this time. I also tried to keep in mind Seth’s recent reference to her own natural rhythms, thinking that if she didn’t want sessions just now, that might actually be part of the healing process.

(Today Jane’s nurse, Peggy Jowett, put her through a regimen of moving, washing, and changing dressings—a busy two hours that was all Jane could handle, we agreed. Was her later malaise simply the result of physical exhaustion? I didn’t really think so while granting the possibility, for Jane also dozed in the mornings and on weekends when no nurses were present, and I changed her dressings on weekends within 20 minutes, so there was little strain involved there.

(“I’m just waiting.” Jane said now, smoking a cigarette as I sat with her at the card table. I’d brought the notebook, as she had suggested I do. Her eyes were heavy, but—“I almost feel something.” she said at 7:25. “Anything,” she said, rocking back and forth in her chair, meaning she was trying to stay awake and would accept whatever she could get. And once again, as we waited I thought that I was the one who’d initiated events this evening, whereas I had trouble understanding why Jane didn’t do more of that herself.

(A case in point: When he visited today, Mr. Wrigley said Jane should wear support stockings or bandages around her feet and legs in the daytime, to help reduce the swelling in her feet and ankles. Otherwise, he said, ulcers could develop there also. This frightened Jane, but she didn’t tell me until some hours later. Her feet are somewhat swollen—edema—but look much better than they did last year, say, and their color is normal. She does wear my elasticized winter stockings, which offer some such protective support. These kinds of dilemmas are what bother us about the medical establishment: We don’t know whether to completely ignore such advice, or to heed it and thus accept medicine’s prognosis. I do personally credit the body with having terrific healing powers—especially if, as I said to Jane recently, the body is left alone to repair itself. But obviously, this leaving alone is often very difficult to achieve in that fashion. It may even be, I’ve often thought, that one cannot really leave the body alone, nor be meant to—for the physical body would be a portion of the reality each individual creates, and so is bound to be intimately involved with individual fears, desires, intents, successes, etc.)

(I’d planned to mow grass for a few minutes after the session—it was dusk by now—but I had to wait. So did Jane: “Now that he said that. I’ll have to wait....” I lit a cigarette for her. I told her the session had lasted for 27 minutes, which pleased her, “since I didn’t think I could get two words out of me to begin with.” But I’d known she could do it.

(“You sure did a lot more tonight than you expected to, though, didn’t you?”