“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(Sue Watkins witnessed tonight’s session. She intended to leave before session time, but Jane invited her to stay at 8:50. Sue’s unexpected presence is a fine example of how spontaneous events can influence a session in a very creative way — as Sue’s notes, quoted later, will show.

(As usual, Jane had no idea of what tonight’s session would include. [...] This quality also turned up in the session, in Seth’s funny, over-elaborate requests for me to use just the right punctuation and paragraphing.

[...] She had much more to say here, especially concerning her impressions of Jane, Seth, and the great energy involved in these sessions. It developed that Sue had begun to experience and formulate some impressions both before and during the session.

(“As I sat here before the session,” Sue wrote, “I got an impression of Seth that I’d never had before. [...] When Seth came ‘around’ just before the session, it seemed that something within Jane began to crank up, to whirl or accelerate faster and faster until a certain incredibly other speed was reached — a part of Jane’s consciousness that is called Seth.

(In this case, though, too much time passed between sessions. The regularly scheduled session for last Wednesday night wasn’t held while we made ready for several approaching events, and as the days went by Jane [and I] simply forgot about what was coming up in “Unknown” Reality. [...] Usually a certain kind of serene existence makes the best kind of day-by-day framework for these sessions and our other creative work, even while those days may contain within them points of unusual interest or excitement [such as Jane’s weekly ESP class]. [...]

(The 704th session was held a week ago. [...] He’s remarked more than once that he’ll close a session by dictating the heading for the next chapter, or whatever, “so that Ruburt [Jane] knows what I am doing. [...]

[...] Tam will also look at my first rough sketches for Jane’s book of poetry, Dialogues of the Soul and Mortal Self in Time.¹ Then on Wednesday night he’ll witness the scheduled 706th session. If Seth comes through with material for “Unknown” Reality, Tam will be the first “outsider” to sit in on a session for this work. [...]

[...] However, for the reasons given in Note 3 for Session 687, in Volume 1, we’d rather think of the molecular components of cells as participating in the structures of a variety of forms. (And I can note a week later that at the end of Session 707, Seth makes his own comment about cells surviving changes of form.)

Your interest in these sessions must indeed compete with ordinary daily endeavors, and there will be, as you realize, fluctuations in your interest and indeed energy. The regularity of our sessions is our best insurance that they will continue. Ruburt is of course free, when he feels indisposed, to call a session off, but I would prefer when possible that some sort of a session be held, if only a very brief one.

[...] I hope to go into these matters more deeply at our next session. Nor have I forgotten that I spoke of an informal session; when your recorder is fixed we will have such a session, when you can be relieved for once from your note taking, Joseph. [...]

(Jane did not feel well, but decided to attempt the session anyhow. [...] She did not smoke during the session.)

You may of course, Joseph, also call off a session for similar reasons of your own. You are not to feel bound to the sessions, but should have them because you want them. [...]

(Jane said that now she is starting to get “little glimmerings before a session,” telling her when it is to begin, with the new voice. When Seth came through regularly she always knew beforehand of his emotional presence, she said, and so had no doubts or questions about beginning a session.

(Jane gave a rather long and intense session last night for her ESP class, speaking with both voices. The session was recorded, and when obtained a copy will be inserted into this record.

(Once again Jane began the session speaking in the new voice: higher in pitch, clear, formal and somewhat distant. [...]

[...] She had been aware of the effect during last night’s unscheduled session also.

Seth’s personality was expressing itself much more freely now that it was released from the board, particularly after the surprising fourteenth session. [...] We were still astonished by the fact of the sessions themselves. [...] We began sessions at 9 P.M. Five minutes before nine, I’d get that feeling again, that I was going to leap from a high diving board into a deep pool—and without knowing for sure whether or not I could swim.

Running into the session’s second hour, my voice had sounded progressively more hoarse, and it was the first time in sessions that it had ever shown signs of strain. [...] Would you like to take a break, or end the session? [...]

[...] Our first Ouija board session had been on December 2, 1963. By the end of January we had twenty sessions and some 230 pages of typewritten material. [...] We saw that the sessions had a kind of order, but its significance escaped us. [...]

[...] From this session on, there was always some voice change during sessions, but the deep booming tones were the exception rather than the rule for some time to come. [...]

[...] For our part we want to know whether Dr. Instream understands that he was in York Beach on the same night a photo of York Beach was used in a session, or whether he remembers reading about York Beach in previous sessions.

(Jane now told me she thought the “two people” referred to by Seth in the 2nd envelope test in the 180th session, were Dr. Instream and his wife Judy. [...] We now know, of course, that Dr. Instream and his wife were in York Beach on the night of the 180th session.

[...] It will be remembered that Jane’s second envelope test was held on the night of August 23, in the 180th session, and that the test photo featured Jane on the waterfront at York Beach. [...]

(It was a very hot and humid night but we held the session in our small back room. [...]

12. A note added later: I’m sorry to write that Seth didn’t discuss historical probabilities in the 736th session, or national counterparts either. I forgot to remind Jane of those topics before that session, just as I forgot to ask Seth about them while he was speaking. Several more sessions were held before I discovered the lapse, which occurred partly because I hadn’t typed the 735th session yet, and neglected to refer to my handwritten notes, and partly because in the meantime Seth had returned to his material on the families of consciousness. My error was unfortunate, since I feel that his information would have been most original, enhancing future sessions.

(As we waited for the session to begin Jane abruptly received a block of impressions from Seth. They concerned the opposing uses of personal power by two individuals whom we’d encountered within the last week: the woman lawyer who had interrupted the session last Wednesday evening, and who is so afraid of her power; and the young classical guitarist who had visited us last night, and who revels in the positive use of his power. [...] Then she launched into the session before I could finish these notes. [...]

The 726th session was held on a Monday night, and was the last one for “Unknown” Reality for the year. During a private session on the Wednesday night following, Seth had a few things to say relative to our upcoming house adventures:

6. For some of Seth’s material in Personal Reality on true aggression, see Session 634 for Chapter 8, and Session 642 for Chapter 11.

[...] I’ve had the question in mind ever since Seth discussed separate, childhood snapshots of Jane and me in the same terms during the first session for “Unknown” Reality. [See the 679th session, with the notes relevant to Jane and her family background. In that session, Seth told us that the 12 year old Jane in the photo under discussion was to become probable to the one I eventually met and married.] Beside whatever Seth could tell us about her parents, I was curious to know whether the Jane who was shown at the age of 3 might be — or was destined to become — another probable Jane.⁶)

[...] The evening was very warm as we waited for tonight’s session to start. I reminded Jane of the two questions I’d put off from Monday’s abbreviated session, but Seth made only a brief reference to them at the end of tonight’s material.)

And, of course, while writing this note I found that Seth’s material in tonight’s 699th session, as well as Jane’s in the whole of Appendix 4, are very reminiscent of what I call double dreaming. See the 692nd session, with its Note 2.

[...] [See the appropriate note at 10:34 in the 694th session.] Then, as we ate, Jane had asked me once again if “Unknown” Reality had any organization — or purpose: “Where’s Seth going with it?” I suggested she forget such worries and let the work come out in its own way, explaining that portions of these notes were concerned with recording the circumstances surrounding just that procedure.

(Jane dozed a few times while reading yesterday’s session, which she managed to do fairly well. [...] I began doing some mail while she slept briefly after reading the session. [...]

(After everybody had made their rounds concerning her vitals, which were all normal, Jane said she might try for a short session. “Maybe I need a little session, at least every day, just to keep my spirits up,” she said. [...]

(I read to her Seth’s opening paragraphs of yesterday’s session; these dealt with the roles of the conscious and subconscious minds. I didn’t get to go over any of the other past sessions with her before I turned her on her right side at 4:30. [...]

[...] You should both have creative breakthroughs of your own in response to these sessions—and again, this session continues at other levels of your being. [...]

I will begin book sessions again Wednesday, and we will resume our two sessions a week. Those sessions will help in other ways also, for they also provide a certain psychic boost at certain times.

(Note the date for this evening’s session. [...] Now with the New Year we want to start up a schedule for the sessions, and stick to it for the most part. [...]

[...] In the holiday interim the sessions seemed to fade far away into the background. When we reach that state, I personally find myself thinking that the sessions make little difference one way or the other. [...]

[...] Even today, the day after this deleted session was held, I received a call from Tam at Prentice-Hall, wanting to know about cutting the length of the book. [...]

[...] She did say her panicky feelings had to do with the session about her mother Marie yesterday, and a dream she’d had last night. [...] “Read me — read me yesterday’s session. [...]

(I read her the session at 2:48. [...] She didn’t want to hear my notes for the session, or the poem she’d dictated yesterday. [...]

(Tearfully, moaning, at 2:58: “I’m going to try, Rob, to have a session. [...]

[...] Again, the session should automatically help calm his mind and let the panic dissipate.

The session continued. [...] He was to attend many other sessions. [...] Some excellent evidential material was to be obtained through sessions with Mark several years later. [...]

It was Session 28, February 24, 1964 and our second session without the board. Seth was right; I had grown anxious wondering just when to dispense with it in a session and let him speak, yet it represented something solid and real that helped the transition take place. [...]

I was going to mention the furniture arrangements that we embarked upon during this time but find that a few excerpts from this same session give a pretty fair picture. [...] We’d been in the apartment three years when the sessions began, yet in a few session comments Seth managed to clear up several points that we had had never settled.

[...] I was half reluctant to hold a session and half curious as to how Seth would handle other people. [...] The session was actually a breakthrough in many respects, as these excerpts will show. [...]

(Now these notes hark back to the end of the 732nd session, when I wrote a paragraph concerning Sue Watkins, our longtime friend who attends class as often as she can these days from the small town where she now lives, some 35 miles north of Elmira. Jane listed Seth’s families of consciousness last month in Session 732, but wound up the evening’s work thinking that several years ago, soon after she’d initiated the Sumari breakthrough, Sue had psychically tuned in on the name of a second family of consciousness — one that Seth didn’t give in the 732nd session. Jane thought the family name was similar to the “Gramada” that Seth had described; at session’s end I wrote that I intended to check our records for the missing name, and to ask Seth about it — but I neglected to do either of those things. One of the reasons for my failure to settle the matter right away was the lack of any immediate pressure to do so, for we hadn’t seen Sue since before the 729th session was held; that’s over five weeks ago now; newspaper work has often kept her too busy to make the trip to Elmira.

7. Added later: See the notes on the hill house at the beginning of the 736th session. In them I wrote about the delay involved before Jane’s and my perceptions of that particular dwelling blossomed within our conscious minds in any meaningful way; the results of that joint metamorphosis are described in sessions 738–39. In the meantime, then, Seth’s material in this (737th) session deals only with the house on Foster Avenue, in Elmira, and — as discussed shortly — with Mr. Markle’s house in Sayre, Pennsylvania, since those two places were the ones we were consciously interested in at the moment. [...]

(Sue did attend class last Tuesday evening, however, arriving just in time before it began to read the transcript for the 732nd session. Then during class she handed me a note that I’ll paraphrase a bit here: “In a session on Sumari I witnessed in 1971 or early 1972 — I picked up a family-of-consciousness name, and Seth said it was ‘Grunaargh.’ It wasn’t on the list given last month.”

[...] Going through back sessions late this evening, I found what I wanted. Sue had picked up on the Grunaargh¹ during the 598th session, which she’d recorded for me the evening after Jane had made the whole Sumari breakthrough in class, on November 23, 1971.

We will also all improve so that you should actually find your energies refreshed at the end of a session, though we have not reached that level at this time. The mere fact that the sessions continue, and have continued despite ordinary fluctuations of daily life, is proof of the validity of the sessions.

The reason that direct inner experience is often cut off and rarely sustained is that the ego almost immediately clamps down to examine the phenomena; and, Joseph, the bulk of the sessions is somewhat shorter for two reasons. [...] I have given you some shorter sessions, though not many, because of your own changed schedule, and because I work through your energies, your combined energies, in a way that I have yet to explain.

[...] Jane yawned and remarked that if she could be out until the end of the session she would be quite happy. [...] I also felt the sessions were threatened, though I did not say so, but Jane instantly sensed my mood. [...]

[...] This time, napping before the session, she awoke wondering about the time; she saw the veil of light again, but not the clock and could not determine the time.

(Sam Levine knows about Seth but has never attended a session. [...] He has expressed neither belief nor disbelief; he has also listened to part of the tape recording we made of Jane when delivering the 25th session. [...] Someday Jane and I intend to put the pressure on Sam and make him attend a session, no matter how busy he is. [Session 25 is in Vol. [...]

(Today we had made an initial payment towards acquiring the Birch house, dealt with so extensively in the 65th session. [...] Before the session was due Jane said she felt exhausted and nervous; she reported Seth had been with her at times during the afternoon, “buzzing around,” as she put it, while she thought about the house.

[...] Already the change was more drastic than it had been for many sessions. [...] The 63rd session, when John Bradley had last been a witness, had also seen some voice changes; but they had been mild compared to this.)

(For one who felt poorly at the start of the session, Jane now said she felt fine. [...] Our cat, Willy, now became active as break wore on, and as he has done for most recent sessions. [...]

[...] If I could just put my head down and relax I’d be so relieved—then maybe I’d switch over to a session.” [...] “I guess after the session last night I got more frightened. [...]

(This morning I typed the session for November 7, as I tried to catch up on the backlog of material we’ve been accumulating lately. [...]

(Appearances can be deceiving, though: After lunch Jane told me that her feelings of panic had returned [see the session for November 7, for instance]. [...]

[...] “Do you want to have a session?”

(The stage had been well-set for the afternoon session, however. [...] Tam had witnessed a session before—the 434th on September 6, 1968—but Eve had not; she was a little nervous before the session began, and like many others was surprised by the session’s actual beginning and its manner of presentation.)

(On this visit also Tam read the 418th session, of June 24, 1968. In this session were perhaps a page and a half of Seth’s clairvoyant data re Tam and Miss Carr. [...] Tam noted the correct data in the 418th session, so this material has now been checked at least once.

(One section of the session was missed by me entirely, since I had left the house thinking the session over. [...]

(This a long session, given for Tam Mossman and Eve Naudain, of Prentice-Hall and New York City. [...]

(The Gallaghers witnessed the unscheduled session, the 182nd. Lorraine knows them superficially, having witnessed a few sessions with them. We find no reference to either Lorraine or York Beach in the 182nd session. It happens that this session was reconstructed from memory; since it was unscheduled I had not been prepared to take formal notes. [...]

(It will be remembered that our 2nd envelope test, held during the 180th session, was held on August 23, and that it featured a photograph of Jane at York Beach. Now checking our records, we saw that an unscheduled session was held on August 28. [...]

(Our encountering the Gallaghers last Saturday evening led to the strange unscheduled 192nd session, incidentally. In that session Bill Gallagher asked Seth about the possibility of locating artifacts in the waters of Seneca Lake. [...]

(Up until now, although the session was being held in our front room, none of us had given a thought to traffic noise. [...] I was of course aware of my own irritation; Jane concurred at the end of the session.

(At lunch today I suggested to Jane that she put together a short book on the Frameworks 1 and 2 material Seth has given us since he introduced that concept in a private session last September 17, 1977. We’ve had 31 private or nonbook sessions since then, and a number of them contain information on Frameworks 1 and 2 — much of it relevant to that presented in Mass Events. [...] In a way the suggestion was my idea of trying to do something about Seth producing books within books, as I discussed in my opening notes for the 814th session; but Seth is so prolific that it seems we’ll never get all of his material published at this time.

(Session 819, which was held last Saturday evening, had nothing to do with Mass Events. In our opinion tonight’s session did, however, and for a number of reasons that will become obvious as it’s read. [...]

(Jane showed more interest in my idea than I’d thought she would, and spent the afternoon going over those private sessions. [...] Still, she wanted to try for the session. [...]

To some extent the material on Frameworks 1 and 2 is of course an example of the entire idea, for you receive a good deal of information in sessions not given to book dictation — simply because, while our books are extremely free, still they must be colored by your ideas of what books are.

(Jane had felt for several days that Seth would address the session to Dr. Instream, and so he did. Jane’s eyes remained closed for the entire session. She began the session while sitting down. More or less as I had anticipated, she began speaking too rapidly for me to take notes effectively, although at times during the session I was able to keep up with her. [...] Thus this session is taken from the tape itself, largely, and necessitated replaying it several times.

(We had indicated to Dr. Instream last week that we would record a session upon returning home, and ship him the tape for his own use. [...] The session was recorded with the Gallaghers as witnesses, at their home, and turned out well. There follows the little talk Jane gave on tape before the actual session began:

[...] She remained standing in her accustomed spot until the end of the session. [...] In my opinion these exceeded the loud passages in the 158th session. Jane had cleared her throat a few times toward the end of the session, but now displayed no strain, or unusual fatigue.

(This point was abundantly made, for although we did not know it at the time, the session was due to resume at midnight. [...] The following is taken from the tape verbatim, and includes a statement from Bill Gallagher, who witnessed the session with his wife Peggy. It was made immediately after the end of the session; perhaps a few minutes were lost here when I made a false start on the recorder, due to inexperience, and had to start the exchange between Jane and myself over.