“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

Now, your candle episode was legitimate. It was not some breeze playfully passing by. [...] The candle was moved. The flame was moved, if my friend Ruburt will forgive me, by a friendly spirit who was within call. I can’t understand why he did not know the message was received. [...]

(Seth withdrew, and as break was starting and Jane began coming out of trance, Florence, shaking her fingers after writing for so long, made a comment that she wished the tape recorder was here. [...]

(Seth withdrew and there was a class break.)

Now that was a fine sermon and I shall take it to heart. [...]

[...] I hoped such a hypnotist could act therefore as a guide, if the personality was ready to begin a journey to health. The inner personality was not ready.

(Jane’s pace was now rather slow, and was to get much slower, with many long pauses. [...]

[...] They were not caused by me, and yet the experience itself, as any new experience, any worthwhile endeavor, any breakthrough, was bound to challenge the abilities of the personality.

My personality itself has been a stabilizing influence, and I have given Ruburt counsel even when he was not aware of my doing so. [...]

[...] He was dragging a large tarpaulin upon which was piled a miscellaneous collection of camping equipment; he was pulling the tarpaulin down the center grassy area of the camping grounds, heading toward the entrance.

(At 8:55 PM Jane was still sitting out on the front steps; it had been a very hot day, and a busy one for us. By this time I was getting my papers together for the session. [...]

[...] In the past he was not as honest as he is now with himself, and in his younger years as an adolescent he would never allow himself to know exactly what he was angry at.

[...] Jane was dissociated as usual. Her hands still felt somewhat fat, she said, though the sensation was much milder than before. [...]

[...] The exchange was too rapid to take down verbatim, and I so told John. He said he remembered the information Seth was giving him. [...] John was concerned about where he would go to beyond the triangle, for at first glance he said he seemed to have nowhere to move to.)

[...] Jane’s trance was a good one. Her eyes opened occasionally, and her pace was quite fast comparatively throughout. [...]

(Speculating about a triangle in which he was involved, John said he could see where the weak point would be his immediate superior, his district manager in Rochester, and the strong point would be the regional manager in Long Island. John told us his district manager was offered the job of regional manager recently, but turned it down for various reasons; more money would have been involved also.

[...] Again Jane’s trance was deep. She was some little time coming out of it. [...]

(Because of the witnesses the session was held in our living room. Again traffic noise was quite audible, yet it did not bother any of us unduly, as it had during the last session. [...] Her manner was quite expressive and she used many gestures.)

[...] Jane reported that she was quite a bit more dissociated than usual for a first delivery. [...] Bill Gallagher said he agreed in general with what Jane was saying about his case, as far as he could follow the involved sentences in dictation.)

[...] Her delivery was faster, and her voice was becoming more emphatic, and louder at times.)

[...] Jane was well dissociated again. [...] It was hard for him to describe, he said.

[...] She was smoking. Her voice was good, with pauses.)

[...] There was none, and she told me later she felt no particular reaction. [...] I took this to mean she was still concerned with the three people data already cited, even though I had waited until she paused in a definite manner before making the comment.

[...] It was mailed to Jane and me on August 11,1966 by my mother, but was not used as envelope object.)

[...] It was mailed to Jane and me on August 11,1966 by my mother, but was not used as envelope object.)

I saw the head of a very old man, in his late 80’s or early 90’s. I had no doubt that this was a definitely probable version of myself in this reality. [...] Through the hair I could see the pulsing bluish veins in the skin as it lay over the bone — and in some fashion this sight alone was most evocative of the very young and the very old. [...] I knew that I was resting, and that I wasn’t senile. I don’t believe I was bedridden, but that I was being cared for somehow.

[...] I was sure that this old man was me, though, and no one else. I was very thin beneath the blanket, which I believe was an ivory color.

[...] As I started drifting toward sleep I became aware that I was looking at my own head; the image lasted for several seconds and was quite clear, without being needle-sharp. My view was from my right side as I lay face up on the cot. [...]

[...] I was tempted to ask Seth to explain his idea of what good milk was like, and in what life [or lives] he’d enjoyed such a potion, but I didn’t want to interrupt the flow of the material. [...]

I was delighted when Jane began to show physical improvements almost at once during those early August days, and so was she. [...] And as soon as I realized she was going to continue the series for a while, I jokingly asked her what was going on: “What do you think you’re up to, hon? Are you doing a book within a book, or what?” My wife didn’t answer yes or no, but I could see that she was pleased, and that she was thinking about it. [...]

[...] Sue was now working on the last two chapters of the second and last volume of Conversations. Early in October I returned Mass Events to our publisher once more; it was ready to be set in type. [...] Her walking especially was better, and I was able to take her on an occasional drive in the beautiful country.

[...] All went well: The radiation released into the atmosphere was far below permissible limits. Surprisingly, the procedure was completed in only 13 days—considerably less than the estimated three to four weeks required for the job. [...] Twelve days after the venting was completed, two engineers from TMI entered the enormous containment building on the first brief inspection trip to gather photographic, radiation, and other data.

By the fourth week in July, a few days after finishing God of Jane, Jane was reading over the 17 chapters she’d done on her third Seven novel, Oversoul Seven and the Museum of Time.³ She made notes for Seven Three, as she called it. Then she wrote in her journal on the 24th: “I was looking over Seven Three for the first time in 14 months when sub rights called about the movie contract for the first Seven—so that’s no coincidence! [...]

(The temperature was up to almost 30 degrees by the time I left for 330 today. Our driveway was slippery for the first time, for we’d had perhaps an inch of powdery snow last night. [...]

[...] I explained my answers to the scratching through the pendulum—that I was “itching” to get back to work on Dreams after several interruptions. [...]

[...] The Rose Bowl [football] parade was on TV. [...]

(I told her that impatience was a good sign, that it might furnish additional impetus to recover. [...]

He took it for granted that, ideally speaking, he should do such public work, that it was his responsibility, but also that it represented a natural expression of abilities that he was denying because of his fears. So often he told himself that if he got better he would only be too glad to go on television or whatever, or to do whatever he was supposed to do. [...]

[...] It was quiet in the house, and outside, too. [...] Today it was raining at 52 degrees; now it’s 25 above and snowing, with a low close to zero predicted. [...]

[...] As some of his other less auspicious ideas came into prominence, however, that natural healthy withdrawing tendency was also used to some extent (underlined) as a framework that was overextended. [...]

Ruburt had a reason for not going on tour, for example—one that was certainly acceptable enough in a world of conventional understanding. He was saved, so it seemed, from endless explanations; so with a kind of psychological economy that worked far too well for a time the symptoms served to keep him writing at his desk, to regulate the flow of psychic activity, making sure of its direction, and to provide a suitable social reason to refrain from activities that might distract him—from tours or shows, and also even from any onslaught of psychic activity that might follow any unseeming (underlined) spontaneous behavior. [...]

(By 8:50 this evening Jane was not particularly nervous. However she has been somewhat unsettled because of the changes at the gallery and was not in a mood for a session: “If Seth can get anything out of me tonight he’s doing good.”

[...] Jane was dissociated as usual. [...] Jane at first thought it was 11:00 PM. [...]

(Saturday, June 13, Jane and I attended a cocktail party in honor of Dee Masters, who was leaving as director of the art gallery where Jane is employed part time. [...]

[...] Her delivery was not characterized by the exaggerated slowness of the last two or three sessions. [...]

Fear, and a complete, if sometimes momentary loss of confidence, was the basic cause that led to retreat and the physical symptoms. [...] He knew enough so that this was partially counterbalanced. [...]

(Jane began speaking in trance while sitting down; her eyes soon began to open; her pace was fairly good.)

[...] He was on several occasions about ready to visit your Piper. [...]

[...] He understood it, it would seem, of a sudden, but this was only a crystallization of knowledge. [...]

The experience was so shattering that he pleaded for a counter drug, knowing as he did so that this was against all the rules. The drug was refused him in any case. He said that he was glad that he was forced to see the thing through, yet grave doubts brought him here, and will finally lead him into other areas away from such therapy.

[...] I didn’t realize until the session was over that this was the second heading Seth had given for Chapter Ten. [...]

(It isn’t contradictory to say that Jane did have energy, even though she was tired. [...] The song was very clear, lyrical and restful; I had been in a low mood today and now she tried to cheer me up. [...]

[...] Like many young men all through the ages he was on his individual journey, looking for truth, overturning all stones in an effort to find those methods that would help him discover — in capitals — THE WAY.

[...] And we have been conversing with people of some note—I was on my good manners. [...] Obviously I was not annoyed. I was amused, and my amusement on occasions takes odd form. [...]

[...] My vitality is here, and it was not drawn here by long faces nor by sorrow. [...] And the purpose in that point was to let you see that the human individual reaction of a given personality continues. [...]

[...] The momentary fear that you have felt was nothing, and it was not symbolic of a deeper, different fear. [...]

[...] There was another point, however, that I wanted to make, and I have spoken to you many times to get this simple point across, and yet by your actions this evening, all of you then, I can see that I have not put that point across. [...]

[...] When I got to 330 she was having spasms in her inner thigh and buttock muscles—those areas I’d noticed being so tight yesterday. [...] I asked Jane to be sure to not inhibit or turn off the spasms, or tighten up out of fear that something was wrong. [...]

(Not long after the session was over I told Jane I meant to ask Seth to comment on the vivid dream I’d had last night about the Gallaghers and an unkempt young man who was living with them. [...]

[...] She was through with the session in 15 minutes. [...]

[...] Jane was bothered by leg and bladder spasms at the same time. [...]

(Jane, too, was doing better today. She’d had a sore gum for a couple of days, and that was better.)

[...] I was up three times, and this morning it seemed the swelling and tenderness were worse than ever. [...]

(I used the pendulum again this morning, as soon as I was out of bed, and received the same answer. [...]

[...] Through the day the improvements continued: supper was easier going than breakfast and lunch had been. [...]

[...] The main concentration was not yet physical in your terms. What you now think of as the dream state was the waking one, for it was still the recognized form of purposeful activity, creativity, and power. [...]

[...] It was easy to tell that she enjoyed working on Dreams—that she gave permission to be carried away if need be. Perhaps her method of presentation was in keeping with Seth’s own pronouncement at the beginning of his Preface, almost three months ago: “This book will be my most ambitious project thus far. [...]

One mind alone could not come into being from chance alone; one thought could not leap from an infinite number of nerve ends, if matter itself was not initially alive with consciousness, packed with the intent to be. A man who believes life has little meaning quickly leaves life—and a meaningless existence could never produce life (intently). Nor was the universe created for one species alone, by a God who is simply a supervision of the same species—as willful and destructive as man at his worst.

(Long pause.) In your terms of time, however, we will speak of a beginning, and in that beginning it was early man’s dreams that allowed him to cope with physical reality. The dream world was his original learning ground. [...]

Now if you were not the Sumari you would not be here at this particular time, and if all of you did not know what it was to be Sumari you would not be here at all. [...] An ancient language that never was and within those paradoxes what meanings are there for you to learn? [...]

[...] Now some evening I will give you a discourse on the benefits of hot brandy, for it was one of my favorite drinks. The rum was your idea like this concoction you brought this evening. [...]

He was not a priest in a past life, he was a sailor. [...]

[...] Are you witnesses of the reemergence of a language that was never spoken? [...]

[...] Jane had been dissociated, but toward the last realized she was coughing. [...] She drank some water, remarking that as far as she could remember this was the first time she had ever so interrupted a session. [...]

[...] The upshot of all this was that by session time we had about decided to sign the contact.

[...] Jane was dissociated as usual for a first delivery, remembering some of the material in a general way. [...]

[...] But it was also the subject matter, to some degree, that made Mr. Fell cautious, and that finally caused the earlier publisher to turn it down.

[...] Surely her intuitively-chosen manner helped us acclimate to the highly original and creative fact that Jane was learning to speak in a dissociated (or trance) state for Seth, a disembodied worthy who called himself an “energy personality essence.” (I’ll bet that he still does, 16 of our time-bound years after Jane’s death!) Jane’s method was her very individualistic way of developing her great, yet consciously unsuspected powers.

[...] After all, in the conventional sense what was one to do with personal material from whatever source but keep it personal? [...] It wasn’t until after Jane’s death in 1984 that I took the “time” to understand that Jane’s Seth material—her great passionate body of work—really didn’t need to be categorized as public or private—that all of it was simply one multifaceted creative entity.

[...] Laurel Lee Davies, a native of Iowa, wrote to me from California after Jane’s death in September 1984, She was 29, I was 65. [...]

In 10 of the sessions between the numbers 314 and 325 in Volume 7 we see how, with Jane’s need and consent, Seth was reaching into deeper, more penetrating material involving her conscious and unconscious lives. [...]