“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Why would anyone choose a life of illness or poverty? And what about children who die young, or servicemen killed in war? All of these questions came into our minds when Seth began speaking about reincarnation. As I mentioned earlier, when the sessions started I didn’t believe that we survived death once, much less many times. If we lived before, I thought, and if we can’t remember, then what good does it do? “Besides,” I said to Rob, “Seth says that we live in the ‘Spacious Present,’ and that there really isn’t any past, present, and future. So how can we live one life ‘before’ another?”

Some of the answers cropped up in readings given for others, where Seth was dealing with specific cases. I do not give readings or sessions for the public (nor do I charge fees or accept contributions), so the reincarnational readings were those we had for students, friends, or for those who had asked for assistance in a particularly tragic problem. For that matter, Seth doesn’t give such readings unless they have bearing on the matter at hand.

“It is not time for you to run willy-nilly, looking for truth in any treetop. The truth is inside yourself. Your son is not a three-year-old any longer. He is an entity older than you, and he has tried to point out the way to you. … He was not a child taken before his promise was achieved, but a personality who left you when his own reincarnations were finished. He will not return, but go on now to another reality in which his abilities can be used to more advantage.”

Seth went on to give an analysis of Jim’s present personality as it was connected with events from past lives, and to give him some advice about the future. Jim told us earlier that he had been a disc jockey. Now Seth said, “No one can tell you what road to follow. You have the answers within you. Beware of those who give you ready answers. I am speaking in terms of probabilities, for the future is plastic.”

These impressions also included some statements concerning the origin of the disease that killed Peter. Its cause is unknown, and there is no reason to go into my explanation here. But the characteristic symptoms of the disease I gave also described Peter’s condition accurately. The Lindens had not discussed these with us—perhaps they found the subject too painful. Since this information was correct, there is no reason to suppose that the impressions concerning the disease’s causes were wrong, though they are unknown. By the same token, there is no reason to suppose the reincarnational material was any less correct, though we can’t check it because of the long time periods involved. (Some reincarnational data is much more recent and can be checked to some extent if the people involved have the time and want to make the effort. So far we have run across very few priests, and no one else who lived in Atlantis.)

Another similar case, involving the death of a child, concerned a woman who attended a few of my classes. Her fifteen-year-old adopted son had drowned a few months earlier. Seth said in a session that the boy had been a sailor in several past lives and still regarded death by water as preferable to dying on land. The boy had been related to his foster mother in another life, and also returned to help her gain needed inner development. He died early so that his death would make her question, and search for answers. She had been running from medium to medium, trying to contact the boy. In no uncertain terms, Seth told her to stop this practice and to work for inner development instead.

Here is how this process works in a specific instance. Again, a phone call was involved, this time from a man I’ll call Jon who called me from another part of the country, right after my first book was published two years ago. Jon and his wife were both in their early twenties. I’ll call his wife Sally. After coming down with multiple sclerosis, Sally had been given about a year to live, and Jon wanted to ask Seth if anything could be done for her.

“The mental attitude of everyone involved should be altered to one that is more hopeful. The woman is picking up and reacting to the negative thoughts of those who believe her recovery is impossible.

Seth also said that he would outline a program designed to change Sally’s own expectations, and also suggested treatment by an accredited hypnotist who could instill positive suggestions to rouse her will to live.

“He wanted to remarry, but no one would have him because of the daughter. When she could, she defied him. She was a handsome-looking young woman, crippled but not deformed. When she was in her thirties, she was more youthful appearing than many women much younger who had to work in the fields. They had a small farm, and itinerant help. A widowed man with no children came from a nearby village to help out on the farm. He fell in love with her, and despite her condition, took her to his home village.