“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

During this period I was trying the psychological time exercises suggested by Seth, and often, just when I got started, Miss Cunningham would interrupt me. One day I went into the bedroom where it was quiet, closed my eyes, lay down and began clearing my mind of thoughts for my psy-time exercise. Several times Miss Cunningham came to mind: I wanted to ask her doctor about her condition but hesitated because I wasn’t a member of her family.

Miss Cunningham stayed in the nursing home for a short time when the family was notified again that she was unmanagable, and that other arrangements would have to be made. [...] Not wanting to commit her, the relatives returned her to the apartment, in care of a part-time housekeeper.

This time we both stopped in dismay. [...]

Your clock time as you know is camouflage, and does not exist as far as the inner ego is concerned. This certainly should not be strange to you, since you know that even your present personalities can to some extent escape from clock time through the use of psychological time. I have said that there is no time without barriers. The inner ego is aware of fewer barriers and therefore is not bound by time to the degree that the outer ego is bound.

[...] I do not want to be blamed for any distortions that might arise, though at a later time Ruburt will be able to get this sort of material through without such distortion.

Nevertheless the fact remains that he boo-booed, that such errors, while unavoidable at times at this stage, are most regrettable and apt to cast a slur upon the material as a whole.

(She began dictation on time, again without her glasses. [...] At the same time Jane’s pacing also picked up speed.)

I would not take up session time for this material except that my suggestions, if followed, will be most helpful. Also to him a note: even his adolescent, seemingly-undisciplined times were disciplined, giving notice of continuing ego strength, balanced and sometimes over-balanced by intuitional development, in that he never ceased writing from the day that he began.

(October 16, Friday: Didn’t try Psy-time, but lay down on bed for a nap, being tired. Exactly the same thing happened as yesterday, except that this time I saw a different light fixture, off to the left of my inner vision. [...]

[...] To an important extent, you disdain the opinions of your age, of your times. At the same time, to some extent, you act as if you court them. You purposefully go against the conventions and beliefs of your times. [...]

[...] This may sound very simple, but perhaps at times you forget: people show their main characteristics very early in life. They make multitudinous minute decisions at a much earlier age than is believed, as their own natures seek expression, and as those natures interact with the mental, emotional, and physical environment of the times in which they were born.

Through his art, Ruburt never had that sense of fitting with the times, or of receiving its ordinary recognition. [...] In terms of mental, philosophic, esthetic, and artistic terms, however, you each decided to go ahead even if it meant leaving your times behind.

These achievements begin with the simple practice of Psy-Time. [...] It is extremely difficult to use the other Inner Senses without first using Psy-Time, however. In fact some of my students “turned on” their other Inner Senses spontaneously when doing Psy-Time. Some have used Psy-Time to receive information concerning their past lives; in this case, they used many of the Inner Senses together to search out the data they wanted.

What Seth is alluding to is that the practice of Psy-Time does stretch normal consciousness. [...] When you do Psy-Time regularly, you become alert to data that comes through the Inner Senses. [...]

(Two similarities between this time and last time: Although other people weren’t present as they were before, tonight Jane and I were discussing others; and I was also sipping wine [again my first small glass] like before.)

(Unlike last time I was not frightened. [...]

[...] However I felt that at least this time I had not slammed shut any unwitting door I might have opened.

[...] Within each dream, one hundred earthly years may pass, but to you, the dreamer, no time has passed, for you are free of the dimension in which time exists. The time you seem to spend within the dream—or within each life—is only an illusion, and to the inner self no time has passed because there is no time.”

“Your idea of time is false. Time as you experience it is an illusion caused by your own physical senses. [...] The physical senses can only perceive reality a little bit at a time, and so it seems to you that one moment exists and is gone forever, and the next moment comes and like the one before also disappears.

As far as we know, this reconciliation of reincarnation and simultaneous time is original with Seth. Most other theories of reincarnation take the time sequence for granted. [...] Seth’s attitude toward cause and effect will become clear enough in his later explanations of the true nature of “time,” but when Rob first asked the question, Seth answered:

[...] The whole time I felt that so much was possible with the state, that just beyond my ability at this moment lay wonderful accomplishments. … At no time did I see the astral cord.

[...] This time I decided to try and get up astrally, just walk around the room and observe the various stages of activity. [...] The second time I succeeded, getting used to the fine distinction between moving the astral body up while leaving the physical one alone. [...]

It is because of this instantaneous creation and projection of inner reality outward into form that you experience time within the physical system — to train you, to give you time to learn to handle your own creations. [...]

It is unfortunate that I must use terms of time to explain all of this to you, but as I told you many sessions ago, my time is not your time (humorously) … Because you ask specific questions at a specific session, it does not necessarily mean that the program has not been prepared, in your terms, earlier. For on many occasions I will see the questions within your mind, or the minds of your witnesses, and [again in your terms] will therefore answer them ahead of time.

4. In the 14th session Seth came through with some very valuable remarks about his concepts of time — “It is therefore still a reality of some kind to me,” for instance. [...] With a smile: “Viewing a historical moment through your marvelous television, you can refer to much that has passed, [but] one minute of such a referral costs you one minute of present time. Also you end up short-changed: You give up your precious moment in the present, but you do not have a complete (my emphasis) moment in the past to show for it … When I refer back to myself, I do not expend an identical moment of time in doing so.”

[...] They can be in more than one place at one time. [...] Certain portions of these gestalts can then operate as ‘psychological particles’ in time and space, while other portions operate in a wavelike manner outside of time and space. [...]

You felt that you must to some extent at least protect yourselves against your neighbors—who as both of you said often “Would take up all of your time without a qualm”—neighbors or friends who you felt would not understand your goals, however good their intent. You must then jointly protect your time.

[...] You made certain readjustments, the sessions began, time went on. [...] Ruburt knew he would not take a full-time job either. [...]

You were each for some time relieved. These are patterns of attitudes of long standing, and at different times, as Ruburt improved, and new decisions came to mind, he backtracked, and you largely went along. [...]

(Pause at 9:59.) At one time these postcards represented initial original visions and individual interpretations. Later, however, they began to serve as guidebooks consulted ahead of time. [...] When you journey into other realities, or when your consciousness leaves your body, you can also rely upon guidebooks that program your activities ahead of time. [...]

Now in a sense the physical body does this always — that is, it sits astride realities, containing within itself dimensions of time and being that cannot be even verbally described. The cells themselves are “eternal,” though they exist in your world only “for a time.”

Instead of telling you that you take an airplane from a certain airport at a certain time for a particular earthly destination, leaving one latitude and longitude and arriving at another set; instead of telling you that you leave your country for another ruled by a dictator, or a president, or by anarchy, they will tell you that you leave this astral plane for any one of a number of others, ruled as the case may be by lords or masters, gods and goddesses. Instead of pointing out to you, as in earthly travel booklets, the locations of art galleries and museums, they will direct you to the Akashic Records.⁶ Instead of leading you to the archaeological sites of your world (intently), and its great ruins of previous civilizations, they will tell you how to find Atlantis and Mu⁷ and other times in your past.

The energy of your being exists outside of your system, however, and impinges upon it in your terms, becoming “alive” physically at certain points of time and space. Your own greater energy dips in and out of the space-time continuum as you understand it. [...]

[...] Consider this analogy: Taking it for granted that you are indeed multidimensional, you can perceive only so much of your own experience at a time because of the characteristics of physical creaturehood; the three-dimensional system automatically specializes in before-and-after effects.

[...] Your physical brain automatically converts such data into temporal terms so that many of your significant, remembered dream experiences are already translations by the time you recall them. [...]

Try to arrange your time. You can take two or three nights without sessions to read the material, or find other time during the day or whatever, making your own decisions, and a fond good evening. [...]

[...] I also wanted time to reread the most recent sessions particularly, for I think they contain the best material for us at this time. [...]

[...] “By the time it reaches the foot, it almost feels good,” she said. [...]

(Putting off the publication of Dreams, then, is only a ploy to gain some time to defuse the present situation, while Jane’s body struggles to right itself as much as possible. We do believe Seth’s assessment, to the effect that her body is righting itself in numerous areas after years of disuse, of being held down, but at the same time it’s very difficult not to have qualms and doubts about what’s happening at the same time. [...] I knew she’s not in favor of it, but as I said at the time, this seemed to mean that she was indulging the idea of spending the balance of her life sitting down —quite immobile for all practical purposes. I’d told her at the time that I had no great hope that medicine could help much, but still I wondered often enough if the medical profession might be able to offer some sort of help. [...] At times I feared something like this would happen if she wasn’t able to “pull out” of her symptoms on her own—that is, with her own, Seth’s, and my help.

[...] This is one of those bits of data that I return to much later and begin to question, after having let it pass at the time. [...] At times I for one can agree with Seth, but at other times I have strong doubts. [...]

(I’ve taken the time to write the above notes as much as for a reminder to myself as for anything else, and to start off this session as something special. [...] I must admit that at this time I’m pretty well puzzled as how to best help her. [...] Yet last night it had been her arms and elbows—I’d say that during the night she’d wake me up over a dozen times crying in her sleep at the discomfort in her arms. [...]

[...] It may very well be time to do something else with the balance of our lives. [...] I’ve felt that way for some time, now—that our understanding of what human beings are is minute at best. I think it’s very dangerous to take too hard a position at this time on anything we think we’ve learned, for I can’t imagine that in future millennia we’ll ever cling to very much of what we think is ‘true’ today—especially about things like illness. [...] To ask any one person to figure it all out now, and affect a cure on themselves, may simply be asking too much most of the time.... [...]

(Jane said that lately she’d “felt good” about getting back to work on Seth’s Dreams and her own Magical Approach, although actually she hasn’t done much on either of those projects for a very long time now. I also wanted to know what she meant about feeling good, when this noon she’d spent much time listing all the ways in which she didn’t feel good, today. [...] Jane has also cut her trips to the john to just three times a day —incredible! [...]

[...] That sense of beauty, that reorientation, can relieve the feeling of responsibility that he has at times taken upon himself. [...]

(Timothy is Timothy Foote, book editor of Time Magazine, who interviewed Jane last Friday, October 13, concerning a cover story on Richard Bach, etc.)

Things will break loose after the Time article. [...]

Some sessions for example can be quite long, but the time is right.

[...] By this I mean that I am not restricted to a time sequence. [...] We experience time, or what you would call its equivalent nature, in terms of intensities of experience — a psychological time with its own peaks and valleys.

[...] If you gained your sense of personal continuity through associative processes primarily, rather than as a result of the familiarity of self moving through time, then you would experience physical reality in an entirely different fashion. [...] If your perceptive mechanisms were primarily set up as a result of intuitive association rather than time sequence, then you would perceive all of these chairs at one time; or seeing one, you would be aware of the others. [...]

This is somewhat similar to your own emotional feelings when time seems speeded up or slowed down, but it is vastly different in important ways. Our psychological time could be compared in terms of environment to the walls of a room, but in our case the walls would be constantly changing in color, size, height, depth and width.

[...] She’d cried out unintelligible words steadily all afternoon, until finally her voice had begun to falter and crack by supper time. [...] At the time I’d wondered if she was on the downgrade, for I didn’t remember her calling out so steadily in weeks past. [...]

Apropos of our discussion concerning time.

(“Every time we get on this subject something happens,” I said. [...]

[...] Almost immediately Rose, Sally and Rachel said that the aura was suddenly extremely bright; did this several times. [...]

[...] Sally said that sometimes she could see a painting on the far wall and at other times the mist obscured it. [...]

[...] Several more times this happened, aura changes taking place while I subjectively experienced this extension—the same feeling I have in the new sessions with Rob. [...]

At times Jane still becomes depressed, just as she still dozes in her chair. [...] While I spend all of this time working on these essays for Dreams, I’m always afraid I’m leaving her alone too much. [...]

[...] That such feelings are rearoused in us at this time is hardly coincidental in view of our lifelong habits and belief systems; our tendencies toward secretiveness and our desires to be as self-sufficient as possible—even with Jane’s very dependent situation. Different modes of behavior don’t fit our chosen courses of action in physical life “this time.” [...]

[...] Seth put it beautifully a couple of months ago in the session for April 12—the first time Jane spoke for him since leaving the hospital—and I return to it again and again. See the essay for April 16: “The entire issue (of Jane’s living) had been going on for some time, and the argument—the argument being somewhat in the nature of a soul facing its own legislature, or perhaps standing as a jury before itself, setting its own case in a kind of private yet public psychic trial. [...]