“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

You felt inferior to your own comprehension, for one thing. The colors were more brilliant than any physical ones, and so in a fashion you ended up trying a too-literal translation—too literal because a real translation would require colors and even symbols that you do not have on a physical basis. If you think of those colors as being inside you, even in your own cellular comprehension, then you will not be so careful. Do you follow me?

“My friend, Floyd Waterman (I’ll call him), and I were in a five-and-ten-cent store in Sayre, my old hometown. We were both dressed, but knew that we had to take some sort of tests for sexual potency. We stood near the large plate-glass windows at the front of the store—quite exposed for all to see, in other words, including those eating at nearby tables, yet no one seemed to be paying any attention to us…. Floyd had to take the test first, stepping into a little booth such as a cashier might use. As I waited to go next I turned to look out the front windows—and suddenly found myself surrounded on three sides by walls of the most beautiful floor-to-ceiling, intricate and colorful latticework of diamond-shaped glass crystals I could possibly imagine. I cannot describe the intrinsic shimmer and sparkle of those faceted walls, shining and vibrating in warm oranges, browns, yellows, reds, and violets. Each segment of each color was held within a very thin black frame, as on a much cruder scale the pieces of a stained-glass window can be contained by channeled lead strips. I can still ‘see’ those dream lights and colors as I write this account several hours later, after describing them to Jane. I’ve thought of trying to do a painting of my best dream images of all time … yet wonder how I can do it….”

This morning I tried to rough-in a small oil painting of myself standing before one of those walls of crystal color I’d seen in the dream. I had no trouble with the self-portrait, but still ended up quite frustrated. I’d anticipated the failure to some extent: With mere oil paint I just couldn’t match the iridescence of that dream wall of light and color. By session time I was caught. Should I junk the half-finished painting, or try to complete it? I could always make another attempt tomorrow morning, of course, but for some reason I was rebelling at admitting my failure today.

Attempts to paint sculpts however that were often for outdoor use sometimes resulted not only in running together color, but in a mold that built up between layers of color.

You learned how to mix colors in such a way that they would dry uniformly, and to apply them in certain ways (with gestures, implying layers of color one over the other) to facilitate this drying.

(I also work, usually, with one color layer over another, rather than mixing them while wet. This maintains purity and clarity of color—and has been considered sound painting technique over the years.)

(“A connection with many small colored squares. [...] As stated, Jane had images of small colored squares. [...] The painting is made up of many three-quarter-inch squares of brilliant color.

(8th Question: Can you say anything more about the colored squares? “Purples and yellows—many colors. [...] It contains all of these colors; and no connections with the object as far as we know.

(1st Question: What color is the object? [...] Again, we made no connections as far as colors go with the object. [...]

As you for example attempt to blend colors to give an effect, they telepathically send out a continual stream of ever-changing colors. Such a concept as a sentence would be meaningless to them, and yet pattern is involved in the colors so that the shape and form of a color also has meaning. [...]

In some systems colors are used as a prime method of communication. [...] These intricate color communications follow the almost endless emotional shadings possible. [...]

[...] Instead of nouns for example you would have the shape of the ever-moving pattern, instead of a verb the pulsation of the color, or rather of its transmission. Instead of a time sequence of tenses, which they would not need, you have the intensities and depths of color.

(“I mentioned several colors. The color bronze here.” This was in response to my third and last question, for more data on color connected with the object. Jane subjectively feels the bronze reference above deals with the overall color of Bill’s painting, discussed in the envelope object. [...]

(“Blue green, written with a pen, or the color of blue ink.” [...] The reference to green is interesting; my thought being that blue and green are next to each other on the color wheel and perhaps difficult for Seth to distinguish. Both are cool colors.

I mentioned several colors. The color bronze here.

[...] The object was a homemade pattern made on light-colored paper, with hand-ground gray brown earth color for pigment and polymer medium for binder. [...] The effect is like an inkblot, except that the quality and texture of the paint is much superior as far as charm goes; this particular hand-ground pigment, which I make myself by heating a certain Italian earth color, has a texture like fine cement or roughened stone. [...]

[...] The pigment color is quite dark, but not black. The stonelike or rough surface and the dark color enter into the experimental results.

(“The feeling of a fluid dark color, broken by white shapes that appear like blocks.” The wet pigment used to make the object was a fluid dark color, of course. [...]

[...] A dim color. With perhaps dim dark  overtones, or dim gold overtones in a lighter color, with a gray white. [...]

(6th Question: Can you give the color of the object itself? [...] A dim color. [...]

(8th Question: What does that call and the color black refer to? [...] She insisted on a black wall phone, in the face of the company’s efforts to sell her more expensive colored phones, etc. [...]

[...] The day after she’d taken the second dose—in the morning, Saturday —Jane’s little finger on her left hand began to change color toward blue, from the middle joint down. This is the same hand on which her middle finger changed color a couple of weeks ago. [...] I used the massage on Jane’s head, neck, and back, and she said this helped the finger greatly, since she felt muscular activity in the body led to the finder’s turning color. [...]

[...] Yet when I changed the dressing the ulcer itself looked okay, although perhaps a bit redder in color. [...]

[...] Instead, I found the room transformed with spectacular color such as I’d never seen before — brilliant, shimmering, alive and richer than I ever imagined color could be. Everything in the room took on this fantastic other-color life. [...] The white walls were replaced by intricate colored wallpaper and drapes of velvet. The colors seemed to have a natural life themselves, glowing from within, throbbing with vitality.

[...] Instead, my mind was filled with memories of the spectacular colors I had seen. [...] But it seemed that all the color had drained away from the world. [...] I’ve had normal dreams that were in vivid color, but nothing like that, and at no other time has my usual earthly environment been bathed in such iridescence.

I kept exclaiming about the colors and ran into the next room to see if the effect went through the whole apartment. [...] My own hair shone, each separate hair vigorous and sensuous with color. [...]

[...] Dark colors and light colors and shadows.” [...] “Dark colors and light colors and shadows” can refer to either a photo or a painting; the description is quite apt for the painting roughly indicated on page 39.

[...] A lightish color in sunlight. An orange color, and perhaps with scrolls, or scroll shapes, and a banner.

[...] Dark colors and light colors and shadows. [...]

You can also find many connections between psychic activity and color and painting in which you are interested. Now I will tell you, you have never seen the colors of a rainbow unless you have seen them from an out-of-body state. If you want to see the colors of a flower, or my dear friends, of an apple, you must get out of your body to do so. [...]

You can also develop along the same line in the dream state if you give yourself the suggestion that when you are dreaming you will see color truly and remember the colors that you have seen. [...] Now these colors are like nothing in this world. [...]

[...] Now: when you hear this music, in your mind try to translate it into color and design. And when you think of color, then, sense its motion.

You can try this even in regard to color. As an experiment, with a complete palette set up, then almost automatically let your hand drift over the palette and choose its own colors in turn. [...]

Various gradations in color will emerge that could otherwise take years to effect. [...]

(I explained now to Jane that the material tonight was very good, and that I hadn’t given her clues to it, etc., especially as regards the color experiments, characterization, the full-figure work, the essentials required for drawing the full figure convincingly, etc. [...]

(“Also blue, and white, and one strong darker color. [...] There is a strong darker color in a couple of spots on the object, where Don blocked out numbers. [...] Blue and green both being cool colors and side by side on the color wheel.

[...] Something bright, as in a flame color. [...]

(“How about colors connected with the object?”)

Then somehow our conversation led me to wonder whether our cat, Billy, is color-blind, as we’ve heard most animals are. [...] In the light from the lamp above and behind my right shoulder on the room divider, his greenish eyes were so beautifully colored, yet mysterious, that I found it hard to believe he can’t see color. I also asked Jane about what use the gorgeous colors of Billy’s luxurious fur are to him if he can’t appreciate those patches and stripes of sienna, black, warm gray, and pure white. Or do his colors serve other purposes for him that we’re unaware of? Intuitively, I felt that more is involved here than questions of camouflage and protection—that at the very least there must be connections between Billy and his colors in this reality and his source in a nonphysical one.⁴

4. Checking after the session, I learned that cats are believed to have weak color vision. That is more than I’d expected, I told Jane, yet I still find it hard to believe that Billy, for example, doesn’t have a much keener sense than that of his own colors.

(Jane, or Seth, now added two pieces of information that I hadn’t asked for: “The color purple I believe also.” [...] The resultant color can be called a purple, a violet, etc.

The color red. [...]

Impression of light-colored hair on two, and a similarity. [...]

[...] A black or dark color against a light background. [...] My first question concerned colors on the object. [...] Seth’s description of a dim yellow is a most apt description of the color of the cardboard stock used for the object.

[...] If not there is a close resemblance in size, shape and color. [...]

(“How about colors on the object?”)

[...] Seth stated that his mother “was fascinated by numbers,” loved the color blue, and was inordinately fond of flowers. After the session Bill Gallagher told us his mother had been a bookkeeper, was buried wearing a blue dress—blue was her favorite color—and that she was indeed very fond of flowers.)

Red is the most present or immediate of colors. The cool colors are more contemplative, or more indicative of contemplation. [...]

[...] With my inner eye I saw the face of an older man, facing to the left in full color. [...]

Within your system however, color, to man, is more important than shape, though this is not true with all species in your system. Color is closer to emotional experience than shape. [...] The connections between color and emotion are too obvious to discuss here.

To me, an emotion will automatically be translated into color in many instances. Here you see—but try this: do you see a connection between the color red and the word quick?

(Our friend wore his civilian clothes, so even had she met him Jane wouldn’t have been able to observe his uniform colors. [...] Jane noticed its color—this was not the dress blues uniform—and questioned me as to the soldier’s branch of service, etc. Then when we went shopping we picked out my sport coat in a similar color, although I believe neither of us thought of any such connection at the time.

(“A dark or darkish brown coat, the color of some uniforms,” is a reference to a sports coat of corduroy that Jane bought me for Christmas; this is indicated by the Penny’s sales slip for December 18. The coat is a close approximation of the color of the winter topcoat for the everyday U.S. Marine uniform. [...]

[...] They were a deep luminous golden brown; I realized I was so close to them that I could see their minutest details in vivid color, even upper lids that fell over the upper portion of the eyeball. [...]

[...] Strangely, the spasm episode in the dream involved the color effects I knew I’d get when I glazed the painting: I was vividly aware of the texture of the underpainting as the green color was altered into flesh color by the overlay of warm flesh colors in oil.

[...] Its “deductions” about any given event are also necessarily colored by judgments that lie outside of its province. [...]