Jane Roberts

& Seth

JANE ROBERTS (May 8, 1929 – September 5, 1984) was an American author, poet, psychic and trance medium or spirit medium who "channeled" a personality named Seth. She was born in Saratoga Springs, New York and attended Skidmore College. The publication of the Seth texts, known as the Seth Material, established her as one of the preeminent figures in the world of paranormal phenomena.

The Yale University Library maintains a comprehensive archive documenting the work and life of Jane Roberts, including published writings, unpublished writings such as journals and personal papers, correspondence and audio recordings of various channeling sessions, including the Seth Material and other recordings.

"You cannot escape your own attitudes, for they will form the nature of what you see. Quite literally you see what you want to see; and you see your own thoughts and emotional attitudes materialized in physical form. If changes are to occur, they must be mental and psychic changes. These will be reflected in your environment. Negative, distrustful, fearful, or degrading attitudes toward anyone work against the self." ~ Seth (The Nature of Personal Reality)

~SETH~ (8 minutes)

In addition to the Seth texts, which were published in eleven volumes, Roberts was also a published author of science fiction novels, poetry, and several books about ESP development. Her non-channeled books include: How to Develop Your ESP Power (aka The Coming of Seth), The Seth Material, Adventures in Consciousness, Psychic Politics, and The God of Jane. Roberts' novels include The Education of Oversoul Seven, The Further Education of Oversoul Seven, Oversoul Seven and the Museum of Time (all three later reissued in one volume as The Oversoul Seven Trilogy), Emir's Education in the Proper Use of Magical Powers, and The Rebellers among others. Her books, including the novels and the channeled Seth material, have been described as influential in starting the trend of "channeling" and other new age practices such as "dreamwork" and "lucid dreaming."

- Seth: Good and Evil - Jane Roberts

Roberts described the process of writing the Seth books as entering a trance state during which Seth would assume control of her body and speak through her, while her husband wrote down the words she spoke. These episodes are variously referred to as "readings" or "sessions.”

Roberts also purportedly channeled several other personalities, including the philosopher William James, through a process she described as using a typewriter to write "automatically" and the impressionist painter Paul Cézanne.

"People react to negative suggestions only when their own frame of mind is negative. Then we close ourselves off from the constructive energies we need." ~ Seth (The Nature of Personal Reality)



In late 1963, Jane Roberts and her husband, Robert Butts, experimented with a Ouijaboard as part of Roberts' research for a book on extra-sensory perception. According to Roberts and Butts, on December 2, 1963 they began to receive coherent messages from a male personality who eventually identified himself as Seth. Soon after, Jane Roberts reported that she was hearing the messages in her head. She began to dictate the messages instead of using the Ouija board, and the board was eventually abandoned.

For 21 years until Roberts' death in 1984 (with a one-year hiatus due to her final illness), Roberts held regular sessions in which she went into a trance and purportedly spoke on behalf of Seth. Butts served as stenographer, taking the messages down in home-made shorthand, although some sessions were recorded. These messages, channeled from Seth through Roberts, consisting mostly of monologues on a wide variety of topics, are collectively known as the "Seth Material."

The Material through 1969 was published in summary form in The Seth Material, which was written by Jane Roberts using material from the channeling sessions. Beginning in January 1970, Roberts wrote books that she described as dictated by Seth. Roberts claimed no authorship of these books beyond her role as medium. This series of "Seth books" eventually totaled ten volumes, although the last two books appear to be incomplete due to Roberts' illness.

The list of titles includes Seth Speaks (1972); The Nature of Personal Reality (1974); The Unknown Reality (1977-1979), The Nature of the Psyche, Its Human Expression (1979); The Individual and the Nature of Mass Events (1981); and Dreams, Evolution and Value Fulfillment (1986). Robert Butts contributed notes and comments to all the Seth books, and thus was a co-author on all of them.



According to Jane Roberts, Seth described himself as an "energy personality essence no longer focused in physical reality" who was independent of Roberts' subconscious, although Roberts herself expressed skepticism as to Seth's origins, wondering if he was a part of her own personality. Roberts, as Seth, was at times stern, jovial or professorial, and he frequently assumed a distinct accent which was not identifiable. Unlike the psychic Edgar Cayce, whose syntax when speaking in trance was antiquated and convoluted, Roberts' syntax and sentence structures were modern and clear when speaking as Seth.

"The "you" that you presently conceive yourself to be represents the emergence into physical experience of but one probable state of your being, who then directs corporeal life and "frames" and defines all sense data. When your ideas about yourself change, so does your experience." ~ Seth (The Nature of Personal Reality)

Books by Jane Roberts

Roberts, Jane (1970). The Seth Material. reprinted (2001) New Awareness Network. ISBN 978-0971119802

Roberts, Jane and Robert F. Butts (1972). Seth Speaks: The Eternal Validity of the Soul. reprinted (1994) Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 1-878424-07-6

Roberts, Jane (1974). The Nature of Personal Reality. Prentice-Hall. reprinted (1994) Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 1-878424-06-8

Roberts, Jane (1977). The "Unknown" Reality Vol. 1. Prentice-Hall. reprinted (1997) Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 978-1878424259

Roberts, Jane (1979). The "Unknown" Reality Vol. 2. Prentice-Hall. reprinted (1997) Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 978-1878424266

Roberts, Jane (1979). The Nature of the Psyche: Its Human Expression. Prentice-Hall. reprinted (1996) Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 978-1878424228

Roberts, Jane (1981). The Individual and the Nature of Mass Events. Prentice-Hall. reprinted (1994) Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 978-1878424211

Roberts, Jane (1995). The Oversoul Seven Trilogy. Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 1878424173 Edition: Paperback; May 1, 1995 (originally published as three separate books: The Education of Oversoul 7 (1973); The Further Education of Oversoul Seven (1979); Oversoul Seven and the Museum of Time (1984)

Roberts, Jane (1981). The God of Jane: A Psychic Manifesto. reprinted (2000) Moment Point Press. ISBN 978-0966132755

Seth-Related Works from Other Authors

Watkins, Susan M. (2005, 2006), Conversations with Seth 25th Anniversary Edition, in two volumes. Moment Point Press. ISBN 1-930491-05-0 and ISBN 1-930491-09-3 (original version published: Vol. 1 (1980), Vol 2 (1981).

Watkins, Susan M., (2001), Speaking of Jane Roberts, Remembering the author of the Seth material, Moment Point Press ISBN 0-9661327-7-7

Dahl, Lynda Madden (1995). Ten Thousand Whispers. Moment Point Press. ISBN 1-889964-06-9

Stack, Rick (1988). Out-Of-Body Adventures. McGraw-Hill Companies. ISBN 0-8092-4560-4

Ashley, Nancy (1984). Create your own reality : a Seth workbook. Prentice-Hall. ISBN 0131891278

Seth Related Videos & quotes

Seth Speaks Audio 1 of 13

Seth Speaks Audio 2 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 3 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 4 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 5 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 6 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 7 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 8 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 9 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 10 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 11 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 12 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth Speaks Audio 13 of 13 (9 minutes)

Seth quote:

"There must be an open-minded, ad openhearted attitude here. You must not try to use what you have learned in a narrow, limiting way. This hampers your own development. It closes your eyes to many possibilities that will be important to you. It is natural, perhaps, to want to use what you have learned, this information, as a technique to achieve what you at any particular time think desirable, a particular person, a particular thing. But what is important is the inner development. If this is taken care of, it will automatically lead you to the person that is best for you and to the circumstances that will help you develop. To insist that a specific individual or a specific goal be attained through these methods is limiting. There must always be the acknowledgement that you do not consciously as yetrealize the depths of yourself, the goals you have set and thechallenges, and this material should be used to open up your inner horizons and to lead you in those directions toward which your inner self has already set you. If you then egotistically, say - No - this particular situation is what I want, then you may be blocking the inner direction which has been meant for you."

~ Seth (Jane Roberts) from The Early Sessions, Book 8

Thoughts on Seth, part 1. (7 minutes) Jane Roberts

Thoughts on Seth, part 2. (8 minutes) Jane Roberts

Thoughts on Seth, part 3. (8 minutes) Jane Roberts

Thoughts on Seth, part 4. (8 minutes) Jane Roberts

Thoughts on Seth, part 5. (8 minutes) Jane Roberts

Thoughts on Seth, part 6. (8 minutes) Jane Roberts

Thoughts on Seth, part 7. (8 minutes)

Thoughts on Seth, part 8. (8 minutes)

During one ESP Class session, there was a discussion of "possible use of animals to predict earthquakes, and whether people should feel they need to run away from earthquakes".

Seth: "The animals leave! That sounds like good sense to me. Think about it!... Amid the mad scramble, you DO make your own reality. I admit that sounds too simple, but you will not be caught in an earthquake if you do not want to be, and no one dies who has not decided to do so. You make your own reality, or you do not. And if you do not, then you are everywhere a victim, and the universe must be an accidental mechanism appearing with no reason. So that the miraculous picture you have seen of your body came accidentally into creation, and out of some cosmic accident attained its miraculous complexity. And that body was formed so beautifully for no reason except to be a victim. That is the only other alternative to forming your own reality. You cannot have a universe in between. You have a universe formed WITH a reason, or a universe formed WITHOUT a reason. And in a universe of reason, there are no victims. Everything has a reason or nothing has a reason. So, choose your side!"

The Seth Phenomena - Jane Roberts ( 5 minutes)

Seth - Jane Roberts: You Form Your Own Reality

A. According to Seth we create our own reality--literally--through beliefs we hold. This life is only one of many that we live in a variety of times and places. The experiences--both pleasant and distressful--which we encounter are no more real than a dream and appear within our lives as educational devices to demonstrate the consequences of our actions. Because the essence of the universe is love, we are safe and taken care of now and through eternity. We have on-going access to information about the nature of reality and our personal lives, but we must use our conscious minds to evaluate this information and to make decisions. Finally and perhaps most important, there is no authority superior to each person's essential self; Seth's words are merely an attempt to present us with knowledge that we ignore when it comes from our own inner beings.

B. We are multidimensional beings who inhabit many realms and who exist throughout eternity; developing continually into more creative and fulfilled individuals.

C. The universe is of good intent; evil and destruction do not exist except as a scenario. Evidence of evil in the world appears to our senses in order to let us know the consequences of the beliefs we hold, but mankind will awaken from that sadness as from a bad dream.

D. By acknowledging and, whenever possible, following our impulses, we can discover the purpose of our lives and learn how to act in such a way as to benefit both ourselves and the world.

E. There is no authority superior to the guidance of a person's inner self. Seth's words are merely an attempt to present us with the knowledge that we ignore when it comes to our psyches. The entity is the basic self, immortal, nonphysical and the individual is the portion of the whole self that you manage to express physically. Desire, wish, and expectation rule all actions and are the basis for all realities. You create your own reality, there are no exceptions!

Seth: "You create your reality according to your beliefs and expectations, therefore you should examine these carefully. If you do not like some aspect of your world, then examine your own expectations."

"Realize that your physical experience and environment is the materialization of your beliefs. If you find great exuberance, health, effective work, abundance, smiles on the faces of those who you meet, then take it for granted that your beliefs are beneficial. If you see a world that is good, people like you, take it for granted again, that your beliefs are beneficial. But if you find poor health, a lack of meaningful work, a lack of abundance, a world of sorrow and evil, then assume your beliefs are faulty and begin examining them."

"Your world is formed in faithful replica of your own thoughts... If you think positive suggestions to yourself about a situation you send telepathic ammunition for positive use. You must learn to erase a negative thought or picture by replacing it with its opposite."

"You form your own reality. But in forming that reality, you change other realities of which you do not know. The joy, the challenge, the responsibility, the creativity is yours. There is no other message that I can ever give you, or that you can give yourself. You are, each of you, All-That-Is experienced through your own individuality, and the transubstantiation of your flesh."

Channeling - Jane Roberts Seth

Seth [Jane Roberts]:

"You must watch the pictures that you paint with your imagination.Your environment and the conditions of your life at any given time are the direct result of your own inner expectations. If you imagine dire circumstances, ill health or desperate loneliness, these will be "automatically" materialized, for these thoughts themselves bring about the conditions that will give them a reality in physical terms. If you would have good health then you must imagine this as vividly as you fearfully imagine ill health."

Seth Speaks About Beliefs (2 minutes)

Channeling - Jane Roberts - Seth The Interview

"What you see in others is the materialization-the projection of what you think you are-not necessarily, however, of what you are. For example, if others seem deceitful to you, it is because you deceive yourself, and then project this outward upon others." ~ Seth (The Nature of Personal Reality)

So, do you...

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