“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(Jane ate a better lunch today — that is, not enough to keep a bird alive, but still an improvement over most of the month of July: A little soup, a little egg yolk, coffee, a little custard, chocolate milk, and so forth.

(After lunch I read her the session for yesterday, after she’d been unable to read it with either pair of her glasses. Her eyes behaved the same way yesterday. I ended up asking Jane if she wanted to try free association after we’d talked a while, but got no definite answer.

(Later I told Jane of a remark Frank Longwell had made the other day, after I’d explained to him that she’d been having a very rough time this month. “Well,” Frank said, “she always does when she doesn’t have the sessions.” This got Jane thinking, I could see. Both of us have had the thought at times, but Frank’s spontaneous remark hit the mark just right.

(I asked Jane if she thought the sessions served as a balance to those sinful-self, very restrictive ideas — that when she gave up on the sessions that other self was free to exert its power and beliefs. She didn’t know, but I thought it a valid idea. I added that the whole bit put me on the spot, and always had, because I was never sure whether to insist that she have the sessions, or forget them. I’d always been cautious about asking her to keep holding them, for fear that they might come to dominate her life. It would be ironic indeed if it develops that the “truth” is more the other way around. It even appears to me right now, at least, that that more damaging avoidance of sessions has had a very negative impact.

(“Get out your stuff,” Jane said after I’d told her about Frank’s remark and we had discussed it a little. She lay high up on the bed, her head back against her pillows. Her Seth voice was both strained and strong, I thought, although she had no trouble with the words. Her voice was different, though, and the rhythm was distinctly different than usual; she paused every few words.)

Alone, they carry within themselves the splendor of unknown knowledge, and they arise from the deep founts of Ruburt’s life, containing within themselves the neighborhood and world in which he grew, the power and vitality of the people he knew, the resourcefulness and energy that composed reality. Hidden within the sessions there is the splendid vitality of Father Trenton, his (Jane’s) mother, his neighbors and teachers — but beyond that the sessions connect and unite the annals of existence as he has experienced them, so that in speaking with my voice, and for me (quavering), he expresses the blessed vitality and acknowledgments of the universe, as even through the sessions the sweet universe acknowledges his own presence and being. And the two of you together also live within one life that expresses multitudinous voices, and sheds its own mercy, gladness, and joy, out into the world at large, enriching it, renewing the springtimes, and never truly ending.

(4:02 p.m. “That’s it,” Jane said. “I don’t know what he meant by the “Let us continue,” but that’s the last sentence I got. I don’t know — I couldn’t tell whether it was a hello or a goodbye …”

(Jane said she felt “scared and panicky,” and that, I knew, was a good sign. I told her we’d touched something that needed dragging out into the open. Before I could try anything like free association, however, Jane said she had more to give.

(I felt some small glimmers of hope about our progress this afternoon, and of course, hope it continues. Perhaps sessions will help Jane. I also mentioned several times that I’d like to have her return to the house. “But not to the bed there,” I said, referring to the hospital bed we own. “I don’t mean that at all. I mean I want to see you getting around somewhat, at least.”)