“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(This is the first session Jane has held since giving the deleted one for last January 7. Once again, she was very uncomfortable as she sat in her chair across the coffee table from me. Earlier today—as she reaffirmed now—she’d said more than once that she wanted to “get back to the sessions, no matter what,” or how she felt. Her bodily condition presented rather large contrasts: Her upper body was very relaxed, her eyes bleary. Her arms were longer, as they had been for some time now. Her backside was sore, as well as her hips and inner thighs at the groin; she couldn’t move forward easily. At the same time her upper legs above the knees were “soft and mushy,” while below the knees the muscles were hard and tight. Yet her feet were in good shape. These are the highlights of her condition. This morning she’d slept for an hour before lunch.

(Jane said she felt Seth around by 9:20, but that she thought the session would be a short one. I told her I was primarily interested in but two things, both personal: her reactions to Mass Events and God of Jane in connection with her symptoms, and what was going on in her backside and hips. She hasn’t “walked” for weeks now—since last year—and the hip problems especially have persisted now for a number of months. I wanted to hear from Seth something about why her body was taking so long to respond in those areas.

Largely—for I am simplifying here to some considerable degree, but largely—Ruburt felt little difficulties to be encountered in his private search, but in their public expression he was far more cautious. It is impossible, of course, to really separate the two, but as his work became better known, the private search became more of a public issue.

Years ago, when the Gallery of Silence people began to bug him, he felt threatened, afraid that he would become the brunt of fanatics or extremists. He was nevertheless determined to take some kind of a public stand—for not to do so would mean not to express himself through his books at all. He knew he would never give into that course, but he felt that some of that dates back to childhood habits and beliefs, when his very food and bed was given him by the auspices of the public.

(10:05.) He would not stop expressing himself, but immediately felt he needed greater protection. To some extent he doubted his own vision—see the connection with his eye difficulty. Despite this he went on with some considerable courage, determination and vigor in my book and his own to encounter the nitty-gritty, so to speak, to bring out the issues clearly to himself and to the world.

There is much material, of course, dealing with the hostage situation, for as it in a fashion echoes Ruburt’s own situation, so it also symbolizes the situations of many people, which is why the affair captures the attention of the world. Have Ruburt use his recorded suggestions again for a while. (Pause.) Ruburt feels that some of the threats he felt hidden in the world are now out in the open. They actually seem less dangerous than they did before for that reason. To some extent or another there are always social as well as private aspects to a person’s state of health.

(“I was hardly aware of my ass or anything else,” she said. “I felt a whole lot of stuff there on the hostages—stuff it would take forever to get, darn it....” So we talked about what a great book Seth could do on the hostage question. “Before you got through it would cover history, religion, science—the whole works,” Jane said. I agreed that it would certainly encapsulate our whole civilized world structure before Seth finished it. “Forget it,” Jane said. “We’ve got one half done now.” She wanted to know what would happen to Seth’s book on dreams in the meantime, and I explained that it would only wait until the other project was finished. After all, it was waiting now for us to get back to it.

(Jane had been restless during the session, but felt pretty good now. I thought the session contained many good things. It’s Wednesday as I finish typing it. I typed half of it Tuesday night; but Tuesday morning, in keeping with our idea to ground ourselves in new ideas each day, I read the full session to her from my notes.