I was aware of the words perhaps a second before my fingers actually typed them, and to my amazement, the pace actually quickened. I didn’t even have time to read what was on one sheet of paper before, urgently, the next sentence appeared. Two hours passed. Finally I stopped, dazed, lit a cigarette, and almost immediately felt again that strong compulsion to type. Was it a compulsion? It was certainly far more than an impulse, yet I was sure that I could resist it if I chose. Instead, I decided on the spot to go along as an experiment of sorts, to see what would happen.

What happened was the beginning of a book with the rather improbable title given earlier. Except for a short break, I typed steadily for four hours. I had no idea of the quality of the material, but its imaginative fantasy struck me as highly uncharacteristic of my own personality. Outside of dry academic papers, I’ve never done any writing in my adult life.

The rest of the evening I spent trying to trace my own subjective states before and during the experience. This time I didn’t make the mistake of calling anyone, but I was more frightened than I’d been earlier. Now I was faced with the physical evidence before me—a stack of writing produced by me in a way that I could not understand. Where had it come from? Would I be seized by the same compulsion again? And could I really resist if I wanted to, or was I only fooling myself?

Even those questions became unimportant as another, more terrifying thought came to me: If Ram-Ram was considered mad because he sometimes heard voices, where did this put me? Was it possible that schizophrenia was actually caused by some as yet undiscovered virus, and had been passed on by Ram-Ram to me? Impossible, I thought. Yet such an explanation would at least place the entire affair in the realm of the real and reasonable. I knew it was silly, but I took another vitamin C, remembering that large dosages were supposed to combat infections. I also comforted myself that no auditory or visual hallucinations had been involved.

As it happened, the episode was followed by another, and still another. I’m recording these odd chapters here, with no changes. As you read on, you’ll see the strange way in which Oversoul Seven began to take over the ordinary details of my life.

Chapter Four

Gods Wanted (or Chapter One of Jeffery’s “Further Education of Oversoul Seven”)