“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

We were in the middle of a Seth session and Seth was giving his impressions of the Gallaghers’ trip. As I sat in my favorite rocker speaking as Seth, suddenly I found myself in the back seat of a cab. The next instant the cab took such a sharp turn to the right that I was shoved over into the corner of the seat. For a minute I was really frightened. I wasn’t used to being comfortably seated in the living room one minute and in the back seat of a swiftly moving cab the next!

When Peg and Bill returned, we found out that these impressions were quite legitimate. They had paid a three-dollar cab fare to go to the motel from the airport. Peg was quite angry about this, since the same ride two years earlier had cost less than two dollars. Their cab took a very sharp turn to the right. Peg and Bill remembered this vividly, not only because of the sudden turn, but also because this happened right after the driver had run through a traffic light. The turn had been so sharp that it upset them considerably. But the cab driver was not “old, rather than young.” Interestingly enough, Peg said, he did look old from the rear, though, because his neck had a peculiar rough, mottled look. It was also thick and stubby.

He didn’t mention my sensations when I was thrown into the corner of the cab, though. Was this because he didn’t feel them? Or because I was certain to remember these myself? And consider this puzzler: Granted my consciousness traveled from Elmira to San Juan in space, what about time? The session was held on Monday, October 25, 1965, but the incident happened to the Gallaghers one week earlier, on Monday, October 17. Yet I lived that experience just as vividly as though it transpired at that moment in Puerto Rico. (Seth also gave other correct impressions of that same trip.)

The next episode didn’t involve Seth directly, except that I was following his directions in the use of the Inner Senses. I decided to see what impressions of the Gallagher trip I could get on my own. So one morning that same week I lay down, closed my eyes, and gave myself the suggestion that I would find Peg and Bill.

Talk about being excited! Immediately I drew a diagram of the motel and surrounding area. I couldn’t wait for the Gallaghers to return, so I could check this and the Seth impressions. I asked Peg to draw a diagram of their motel and its nearby neighborhood. Peg’s diagram matched mine! My description of the motel was correct, including the center door that led to their room. The motel was on St. Thomas, an island near Puerto Rico. Peg and Bill were there the day of my experiment, and the following day.

How much more fun this sort of thing was than the Instream tests, which we were also conducting! Even our own envelope series was dry in comparison. We mailed copies of the Gallagher material to Dr. Instream. I was really excited about the whole thing and waited eagerly for his comments. I took it for granted that he wouldn’t consider that we had any scientific evidence, but we did have the nearly identical sketches, and the impressions were correct. “He may not consider this scientific enough,” I said to Rob, “but he has to admit, at the very least, that clairvoyance occurred.”

We held seventy-five Instream tests and eighty-three envelope tests between August 1965 and September 1966. Like most people with no background in psychic work, I expected things to be pure and simple. If Seth was what he said he was, then he should be able to look into time and space and closed envelopes as easily as you and I can see the objects in a room. I didn’t realize how much depended on the depth of my trance and on my willingness to give him freedom—I had to learn not to “block” information that came through. I didn’t realize either that little is known about normal perception, much less extrasensory perception, or that no medium is expected to be 100 percent correct. The impressions had to come through me, and as the old saying goes, to err is human.

The items were enclosed in one sealed envelope between two layers of lightproof bristol cardboard, and then the whole thing was placed in another envelope, which was also sealed. I never knew when we would have such a test, and I never saw the envelope before a session. Rob would hand an envelope to me in the middle of a session. I was always in trance, and usually my eyes were closed. (In any case, the test item was enclosed within the two pieces of cardboard and two envelopes, and was quite opaque.) Sometimes I held the envelope to my forehead while delivering impressions. After the session we checked our results. (Specific examples will appear in the next chapter.)

In the data he would often differentiate between his impressions and any of mine that had slipped in, connect mine to their source in personal associations, and tell us whether or not they were legitimate. I am seldom so “blacked out” as to feel as if I were sleeping. Usually I know what is going on, although I may almost instantly forget what has happened. On occasion Seth and I can take turns talking so that I can go in and out of trance in seconds. Sometimes it seems I merge with Seth, feeling his emotions and reactions completely, rather than my own. In this case the Jane-self is far in the background, dozing but dimly conscious. Other times, though less seldom, I am in the foreground and Seth advises me as to what to say.