“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

To say that my editor was surprised by the first eight chapters of my ESP book is putting it mildly. He’d had dealings with me before and knew me well enough to be personally interested. He wrote enthusiastic letters, but he was also worried about the book as it stood. My experiences proved that I’d been a medium all along without knowing it, he said, and this could invalidate the book’s premise—that the experiments would work for anyone to some extent, regardless of their psychic background.

“Don’t tell me, tell the publisher,” Rob said. “For the life of me I can’t understand why Seth’s emergence doesn’t make it a far better book than it would be otherwise.”

As it turned out, it was Seth’s part in the book that bothered the publisher. If I’d played down Seth’s importance and concentrated on some of the other experiments that were also proving successful, then the book would have a very good chance, the editor told me. The other experiments included daily predictions and dream recall; and our dream recall work already had shown us the validity of precognitive dreams.

Remember, this was March of 1964. The sessions had only begun the previous December, and we’d had few instances of ESP in sessions, except for the physical effects that alternately intrigued and frightened me.

I just wasn’t ready, apparently, to put Seth or myself under any kind of test. I was afraid that Seth’s claim to clairvoyance might be subconscious bluff—his or mine—and I didn’t know if I had enough courage to call the bluff or not. And suppose it wasn’t bluff? I wasn’t ready to face that either! I just hadn’t come to terms with my experience yet. I thought of “testing” Seth in a highly rigid, uncompromising manner. Seth had to be right or wrong. The idea of hits and misses in ESP investigations was unknown to me. I had little notion of the inner mechanics involved in mediumship, and most likely my attitude effectively blocked any consistent demonstrations at that time.

It seems ridiculous now that it took me 116 sessions before I’d close my eyes or stop pacing the floor. By the time this first change happened in my trance states, I’d already had my first out-of-body experience, and following Seth’s instructions I was having clairvoyant experiences during daily exercise periods. But I felt in control of these, while Seth was in control of sessions, and to me this made a difference. I agreed to the new trance procedure, but it was still some time before it became the rule rather than the exception. The trance was a deeper one, though, and the material launched into more complicated subjects. It was also during this time that Seth started removing my glasses just before he began to speak.

In 1964, though, when we wrote to Dr. Osis, the trance hadn’t achieved this depth, and I was just getting used to the idea of sitting down in sessions. During 1965 the Seth Material constantly accumulated at our twice weekly sessions. Early that year, Frederick Fell gave me a contract for the ESP book, and I had a deadline to meet.

The idea of ESP tests still frightened me, but I felt that they were inevitable and necessary.

By now we’d experimented with hypnosis in some age-regression and reincarnational work. In these I acted as hypnotist, with Rob as subject. We had never used hypnosis to induce a trance in Seth sessions, however, and we had no experience with hypnosis when the sessions began. Would Dr. Instream want me to go under hypnosis? I wasn’t at all sure that I would consent. Now, after reading about the hypnotic testing undergone by Mrs. Eileen Garrett, the famous medium, I know I’d never stand for it myself. (Self-hypnosis is something else—I use it now to give myself general good-health suggestions.)

Rob sat on one side of me and Dr. Instream on the other. I decided that I wasn’t going to be hypnotized, but I lowered my eyes so as not to be conspicuous. When it became apparent that most of the audience had dutifully gone under—sitting there and reminding me somehow of pigeons with wings neatly folded—I looked up cautiously to see what Dr. Instream was doing. He was looking back. Rob was grinning, watching both of us.

Before we finished with that visit, Dr. Instream told us unofficially that Seth had a “massive intellect” and certainly didn’t seem to be a secondary personality. He cheered me considerably by telling me that I appeared to be in excellent emotional and psychological health.

After speaking to us for less than an hour, the psychologist assured me that I was schizoid, using the sessions to dominate Rob. Once, he grabbed the notes from the bureau and approached me like some wrathful god, waving them in my face. “You think it’s necessary to take all these records, don’t you?” he demanded.

We drove up past the stately university buildings. How neat and orderly! If only life were that neat, I thought. Rob was still trying to comfort me when we arrived at Dr. Instream’s office. Was I really one of those talkative domineering women who used any kind of trick to control their husbands? I looked over at Rob. He stood there, quiet but assured, “cool” versus my “hot”—my idea of a man. Usually I’m talkative. Now I shut up and let Rob do the talking—or tried to let him.

Dr. Instream told us that the psychologist’s behavior was an example of the sort of performance that so upset parapsychologists. But more, he told me once again that he’d found no such tendencies on my part. “The man’s had no experience in the practice of psychology,” he said. “He’s only read textbook cases of this or that.” Then he told us that while the experience was unfortunate, perhaps it was best that we encountered it early in the game. Academic psychologists were apt to take a dim view of mediumship, he said. I would have to let such comments roll off my back. I should have laughed at the young psychologist. I should have said, “Well, it takes one to know one,” or some such.

But the affair bothered me. It was to be some time before I completely trusted myself and my own reactions again. I also felt that I could no longer drag my feet: I had to find out what Seth could or couldn’t do.