“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(The president finished speaking. As the minutes passed and we sat waiting, I asked Jane what she was thinking about. She said she’d decided to hold the session because she “should” have it—whereas last night’s session had been quite spontaneous: she’d wanted to do it. Which raised some intriguing questions about the sense of responsibility she would still feel—indulging that very quality we’re supposed to be so on the lookout for. On the other hand, given our present work orientations the sessions would have to happen sometime during the week—at least twice—and it didn’t seem reasonable to think that Jane would have every one of those on the spontaneous spur of the moment. Somehow, somewhere along the line, some sort of responsible decision to have them would be made....

If you are overconcerned with helping others, then you must first of all begin to question whether or not your creative material, still forming, will serve that purpose, and if not, or if there is a question, you give birth to hesitations and doubts that—again—subvert art’s free flow. An overhanded sense of responsibility leads in the same direction.

(Pause.) Ruburt has felt too responsible to develop his psychic abilities, to produce another “psychically inspired” work of his own. The sense of responsibility of that kind stifles love, which must be free to form its own creativity in its own fashion. Therefore, left alone, Ruburt writes freely, and in an inspired nature because that is (underlined) his nature. It is what he loves to do. When he becomes overly concerned with ideas of responsibility to use his talent, then the love beneath them is smothered to some extent and denied its flow.

(Pause.) This led certainly to conflict. The idea of the public image coming through the correspondence, and as it was interpreted by Ruburt, further deepened the feeling of responsibility. Certainly “a great psychic teacher” had a responsibility of some weight (ironically humorous), and therefore it seemed imperative to Ruburt that he not make errors, that he live up to the characteristics generally ascribed to such an image. Thus, some experimentation was cut out (such as?). He began to think that anything less than this public personality was cowardly.

(10:28.) He is proud of that translation of private creative experience into the artistic public act of publication. He is not a performer, however, in the same way that an actor is, whose art requires for its best execution the lively responsive immediately present audience. He did not want to be a public personality of that kind.

It seemed that this would be thrust upon him, however—that it was expected, and that indeed furthermore he should expect such performance from himself. (Long pause.) His own earlier attitudes about such matters began to seem cowardly, so he tried to divorce himself from them. That idea, however, together with the idea of responsibility, you see, was always in the background.

This was a session Ruburt enjoyed—also one he had out of a sense of responsibility—but at least with some understanding of the issues involved. I bid you then a fond good evening.