“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

“No, of course not,” I said. “But it sure would be a great help if he was.” Just the same, I went into another slump. I still wasn’t at all sure that I believed in the survival of personality after death, and if we didn’t survive, then from whom was I getting these messages? My subconscious? While I used that explanation as a handy whipping boy at times, I didn’t really believe that either: my subconscious was getting enough expression in my short stories and poetry—and without adopting other personality characteristics. A secondary personality? Perhaps, but Seth didn’t fit the picture of any of the case histories we’d read—and neither did I.

While I hesitated trying the experiment, Rob sent Dr. Osis some more of the material. Dr. Osis wrote that he wasn’t interested in the material itself, since it didn’t fall within his field of empirical psychology. He asked us not to send more unless it contained reports of ESP demonstrations. Even though he expressed interest in “testing” Seth for ESP, and suggested again that we try the clairvoyant experiment, I was put off by the letter. So I sulked: If he didn’t express interest in the material, which I thought was terrific, then he could just go find someone else to go looking through his walls!

(It would be January 1966 before the next change in my trance behavior. After having sessions for a year with my eyes closed, I suddenly began opening them again, though the trance was even deeper than before. There was quite a noticeable alteration of muscle pattern and facial gestures—an overall personality change. The expression in the eyes was not only un-Jane-like. It definitely belonged to Seth. To all intents and purposes, Seth was comfortably ensconced in my physical body. This is our current procedure also, and apparently it gives Seth a certain freedom of expression. He often looks directly at Rob, for example, or at anyone else to whom he is speaking.)

In spring 1965, about a year after we wrote Dr. Osis, Rob wrote to Dr. Instream (not his real name), who was connected with a state university in upstate New York. Dr. Instream had been one of the nation’s foremost psychologists in his earlier years, and had investigated many mediums in the past. If Seth was a secondary personality he would know it, I thought. Again we enclosed a few sessions with one letter. Dr. Instream wrote back, expressing interest and inviting us to attend the National Hypnosis Symposium to be held in July 1965.