stiffness

[jbseth]

Hi All,

I came across the following interesting item from Jane Roberts. The following is paragraph 2 and 3 from Psychic Politics, Chapter 9.

"Besides this, I'd been troubled with some annoying health difficulties for several years. There had been some definite improvements since my first visit to the library, but I was anxious to clear up the entire condition. Seth had been of great help, but he told me that I made my own reality just as everyone else did, and it was up to me to alter any conditions that bothered me. My overall health was excellent: but my body was stiff so that I had difficulty getting about. Worse, I understood what I was doing, and while I was bothered by the symptoms I also realized that they provided me with quiet; cutting down distractions while allowing me to do just what I wanted to do – write at my desk. I might complain, yet suppose I was as physically flexible as anyone else – would I have the discipline to just sit in my room and do my work?"

"I'd discovered just about everything I needed to know about my condition through working with my beliefs as Seth suggests in The Nature of Personal Reality – and I knew that I clung to the symptoms because they still served a purpose."


What do you think was the source of Jane's stiffness problem?

-jbseth

[Deb]

they provided me with quiet; cutting down distractions while allowing me to do just what I wanted to do – write at my desk

My first impression is that Jane had a conflict, where she wanted to do one thing (write), while she may have felt she should be doing something else. So she manufactured a "legitimate" excuse to do what she wanted to do, guilt free.

I've done something like this myself at times. I tend to push myself too hard with "shoulds", and then finally one day I feel totally exhausted or like I'm coming down with something and thus permit myself to take a break and spend the day reading or doing something simple like just watching movies. When I do that, I typically feel totally restored the next day.

[jbseth]

Hi Deb,

Thanks for your reply.

Yeah, me too.

I'll find myself in a situation where I'm burning the candle at both ends, so to speak, and then I find that I'm starting to "catch" a cold. 

Of course, after I take some downtime, I start to feel much better.

After reading NOPR many years ago, I started to recognize this pattern really does seem to occur with me from time to time and I really started to grasp the validity of Seth's teaching about beliefs and how they can affect us.


I'll share my own observations on this in a couple of days or so.

jbseth

[jbseth]

Hi Deb, Hi All,

I think that this whole stiffness issue was a result of a "belief" that Jane held.

This "belief" appeared to consist of the idea that, "if" she was flexible, like everyone else, then she might not have the discipline to sit down and "do" her work, her writing.

This belief may have come from her own personal experiences during this life of hers when she wasn't stiff. Maybe she was highly driven, or a compulsive worker bee or perhaps even, a little hyper. I have no idea if any of these statements are valid.

Then again, maybe this belief was just one of her fears.  Either way, it appears that this was definitely a "belief" that she held.


Now, from NOPR, we know that beliefs can be changed. However, it appears to me that rather than working on changing this belief, instead Jane opted to invite "stiffness" into her life, which also, in a way, solved the discipline problem.

Unfortunately, I think there were other personal issues, perhaps having to do with her childhood, that also supported her having this stiffness problem in her life, along with some other health issues as well. I also suspect that she was at least somewhat aware of these other issues as well.

-jbseth