Is There a Sixth Sense? How Do You Access It?

Several years ago I attended a charity event in San Francisco.  It was a night to honor SF 49er Bill Ring, a football player.  As part of the charity's fund raising, several items were being auctioned off.  One of them was a football with all of the 49ers' signatures, including those of Joe Montana, Steve Young, Dwight Clark, Ronnie Lott and Jerry Rice.  The winner would be selected by drawing tickets from a fishbowl.

I looked at the football in a glass case and I knew I wanted it badly.  For some reason, I had this strange feeling that winning it was not only possible, but likely.  It was as if some power of attraction had been unleashed.  While looking at the football, I felt a thrill in my chest. When the drawing finally began, I had this tickly feeling in my head, like someone was tickling my brain with a feather.  I knew I was going to win but I don't know how or why I knew that.  I won it, and while I was going up to collect it, I won the next drawing too -- a pair of tickets to a 49er home game.  What happened?   How did I attract such luck?  How did I sense winning before the fact?

Is there a sixth sense?  I think there is, though we don't know how it works, when it works or why.

I have been unemployed for four months due to the terrible economy.  However, two nights ago I was making up my bed just before sleep and worrying about getting work.  Suddenly I had that tickly feeling in my head again and it told me that jobs would soon become available.  Instead of dismissing it as an idle or stray thought, I brought it into full focus; I kind of mentally grabbed it before it could disperse like smoke in the wind.  I thought to myself, okay, tomorrow I will test this revelation for accuracy and see if any potential jobs appear.

Over the next three days I was contacted by three different job providers who wanted resumes.  It was the first time I've had any employers call me in four months about jobs.  I therefore count the Sixth Sense to have been accurate.   If only this sense would appear more often; if only I could invoke it at will!  However, it is comforting to know that strange forces sometimes operate for our benefit.

Postscript:  There is a common thread that runs through my metaphysical experiences, whether they be the mystical experience, divining my own eternal existence or the premonitions I describe above.  All of these feelings seemed natural and oddly familiar, as if they were things I already knew but had forgotten.

Paranormal Activity: Scary New Movie

Rainy Weather and I Love It

South Park Lampoons "Ghost Hunters"

The latest episode of "South Park" lampoons the television show "Ghost Hunters."  This episode is called "Dead Celebrities" and features Kyle's little brother Ike.  Ike starts seeing dead celebrities, just like in the movie "the Sixth Sense."  Eventually, Kyle and the gang bring in "the Ghost Hunters" team to investigate.  The Ghost Hunters occasionally have sudden panic attacks, saying "DID YOU HEAR THAT? OMIGOD!  DID YOU HEAR THAT??"  Of course there is nothing to hear.  Finally, the team shows up at the house and looks for ghosts in the dark, where the two men piss their pants, followed by the team rushing from the house in panic.

I agree with South Park's portrayal of this foolish show.  The Ghost Hunters go to some old house or castle or hotel where they look for ghosts, usually in the dark.  They shine flashlights around and talk about the place and its legends, interview credulous sorts who describe the horrible phantasms they have witnessed in the place.  Since they have to make the show interesting, they must detect ghosts or paranormal activity or they have no show.  So every show is punctuated with outbursts like those described in South Park.  "ARE THERE ANY GHOSTS HERE?  DID YOU SEE THAT!  OMIGOD!  I AM SO SCARED RIGHT NOW!"

I suspect that most of these outbursts are total BS.  The show is rather boring if you want to know the truth.

It's Colder Than a Witch's Tit In a Brass Bra

The temperatures continue to fall here in Northern California.  In the 1960's there was a rock group called "Three Dog Night."  A three dog night in Australia was when it was so cold you had to sleep with three dogs for warmth.  I supposed in the summer you required only one dog or maybe no dogs at all.  I only have one dog and he's pretty warm, though he does annoy me by hogging the covers.

Please excuse my unfortunate reference to Nancy Pelosi in the title to this post.  I have no way of knowing if her bra is made of brass or of cast iron.

Finally, Fall Weather and a Chill in the Air

The heat of summer is finally disappearing. Technically, fall began on September 22, but it didn't feel like fall until yesterday.   I noticed it yesterday afternoon.

The air smells and feels different when fall finally arrives.  The sunlight is more muted.  There is the sweet smell of dying grasses, wafted on a breeze with a deep new chill...a chill that somehow touches the bone.  This morning I noticed it was downright cold and I am wearing a sweatshirt over my usual t shirt.  October begins tomorrow and the fields around my town are filled with ripe orange pumpkins.  Soon jack-o-lanterns will be found on every porch and doorstep.

I love this time of year.

Spectral voices trying to be heard? Or was it just too much coffee?

People who have survived a near death experience say they saw a glowing light at the end of a dark tunnel.  After their recovery, some say that they sometimes see elements of this light, i.e. as light sparkles in the dark.  I know what they mean.  I have never had a near death experience, but I often see the light sparkles.

For me, the sparkles begin when I am laying in bed at night, thinking of paranormal questions, of loved ones who  have died.  When I do this the sparkles begin, existing only in my mind and not in outer reality, but I see them nevertheless.  When the sparkles begin I always know that I am entering some meditative state where I feel more attuned to souls that have departed this life.  I've never told anyone about this.  It's just something I keep to myself, for obvious reasons.  They already think I'm nuts, why confirm it and remove all doubt?

Sometimes when this happens I close my eyes and can see a panorama of different but very detailed and realistic scenes:  forests of trees, faces, rooms of furniture, buildings, various objects and places.  It doesn't scare me because it just feels like something natural.  Perhaps it's not scary because there's no proof that it originates with another world or spectral beings.  Maybe it's just my nervous little mind purging its data base of old information.  Of course, I like to think it's the former but who knows?

Last night, after I wrote my long post on Bro and his encounter with spirits via EVP, I went to bed and turned off the light.  Immediately the sparkles began, this time with many vivid colors and an increased variety of faces and scenes flowing past my mind's eye.  The intensity of this experience had been raised a few notches over what it normally is.  I felt, wrongly or rightly, that there were many entities on the other side vying for my attention and wanting to be heard.  I thought "Leave me alone, you guys, I want to go to sleep!"  However, I connected the increase in this mental activity with writing my post on Bro.

This morning I was exploring some links to paranormal websites and came across an interview of psychic Sylvia Browne on the Montell Williams Show.  They were discussing communication with the dead.  Browne said (I'm paraphrasing her) that disincarnates try to get through, to be heard, and every time we talk about them or think about them we increase their ability or chances to get through.  That really clicked with me and seemed to explain my greater sensitivity following the post on Bro.

On the other hand, maybe I just had too much coffee to close to bedtime.

Bro's Encounter with a Haunted House

My older brother, whom I will call "Bro" for this article, has always been rather eccentric.  Impulsive even.  So when he saw that movie "White Noise," about communicating with the dead through recording devices, he just had to try it out.  But first, some background.

White noise, if you are in the dark (no pun intended) is the sound of static.  Just as white light is a combination of all possible colors, white noise is a combination of many different sounds.  Television static, when the channels have all gone off the air, is one example.  Wind in the trees, a running stream, rain on the roof, the sound of surf on a sandy beach, all are examples of "white noise."  White noise is very soothing and is not a bad thing.  Really classy business offices have a running water fountain to provide it.  The Japanese, I'm told, love it.  It's great, with the possible exception of background noise in recording devices, as that's where ghosts may lurk, waiting for a chance to whisper in your ear [cue: sound of weird and scary organ music].

Quite a few years back someone was listening to background noise on a tape recorder and thought they heard faint voices.  He decided it was voices of departed souls.  "I hear dead people!" he yelled.  (Okay I just made that part up.)  But he came to believe that was what he was actually hearing -- the voices of dead people, somehow communicating through the background of static, or white noise.  Through the years many people have found and recorded examples of these voices, now called "electronic voice phenomena," or EVP for short.  The film "White Noise" introduced the concept to millions of people who had never heard of it.  Bro was one of them.

Bro decided to record some spooks for himself, so headed out to the local cemetery with his digital camera.  The camera could record sound when it was in video mode, and he took a lot of video.  He heard nothing.  It seems ghosts don't really hang around cemeteries so much.   You can't blame them, the places are just dead.

A few days later Bro was working in a vacant house, making repairs for the owners.  Before he went outside for a smoke, he decided to turn on the video camera and left it running on a saw horse.  When he returned 20 minutes later he replayed the recorded sound and gave himself quite a fright.  He could hear several people in conversation.  It sounded like a family around the dinner table, talking and laughing.  Then there was a blood-curdling scream, as if someone had just shoved a carving knife into Cousin Ernie.

I asked Bro if the recorder could have picked up voices from, say, the house next door, or perhaps somehow recorded a radio transmission.  He didn't think so.  He hadn't heard any neighbor voices and the camera was digital.  When we were kids and had a garage band, our guitar amplifiers were powered with vacuum tubes and would sometimes pick up Spanish speaking radio stations.  It was weird.  Digital recording devices don't do that.  So what was the source of these recorded voices?  Bro was sure of the answer:  dead people!

Later Bro downloaded some software that allows you to augment different sections of the sound, and the voices became clearer still.  Now I'm not disputing the possibility of dead people.  In fact, I came to think that was the number one reason for these voices too.  What other explanation could there be?

Bro took some digital photos of the room where this happened, and one of them had an orb of light floating just below the ceiling.  I have read that these light orbs are common to places thought to be haunted, and there are many examples of them in the literature of the paranormal.  Bro continued making recordings in various places to see what he might find...or what might find him.

For a few days afterwards, Bro would call me up, sometimes waking me in the middle of the night, to play his latest recorded voice.  Some sounded like the slurred speech of a ghoul or, at least what I imagined a ghoul with a speech impediment might sound like.  One was of a female voice screaming.  Other voices were imploring, "Help me! Help me!" This gave me the willies all right.

For the first time in my life, life after death seemed real.  It was illuminating in some ways.  I felt like someone might feel if Bigfoot knocked on his door or Nessie really did poke her head up out of Loch Ness one day and eat a few fishermen.  Omigod, they do exist!  Even more surprising, I was able to accept the existence of ghosts as a fact without going bonkers.  I was amazed at my own composure in light of this revelation.  "Hey honey, Bro proved today that there really is life after death.  What's for dinner?"

Bro eventually came to the conclusion that some of these spirits were malevolent.  He had scared himself silly.  One day I went over to his house and discovered that he had painted a huge cross on his front door.  His neighbors began watching his comings and goings by peeking through windows just before closing the curtains and locking the doors.

Bro eventually erased all the recordings and warned me sternly about experimenting with EVP.  He felt he had opened doors that are better left closed.  He started reading the Bible and learned that people who contact the dead are called "soothsayers," and such practices are Biblically forbidden.

Bro then became very religious, though he had been a hell-raiser for the greatest part of his life, smoking, drinking and carousing with loose women.  Almost overnight he became Elmer Gantry, preaching fire and damnation to all the sinners in his midst.  People fled in terror at his approach.

Some good did come of it all, though.  Bro gave up smoking after forty years of it, stopped looking at porn on the internet, and began quoting scripture at anyone who pisses him off.  All of which goes to prove that strange things can happen when you go poking around in dark, cobwebbed corners that are better left undisturbed.  As for me, I have never tried to record EVP phenomena.  I don't have a big enough nightlight to take the chance.

My New Theme: Rain on the Window

Yesterday I experimented with using a background photo for my blog.  I found one where the theme was rain on a window and the colors were various shades of pinks, purples, grays and beige.  I would never have guessed that this color combination could look so good.  PINKS?  What am I, a sissy?  But they look good and are rather gender-neutral.

I chose a rain them because autumn and rain are two of my favorite things.  I love to hear rain on the roof and on the window panes.  I love candles glowing against the dark as well as a hearth with a warm fire in winter.  With those items present, all I need now is a good old fashioned overstuffed armchair, a hot cup of coffee and a really good book.  If no book, then a good scary show on the Chiller cable channel will do nicely.

I had forgotten how hard it is to get a new blog noticed.  Of course, it helps if you post every day.  I will have to do better in that regard.

Ending It All: Jumpers and the Golden Gate Bridge

I was recently made aware of a fascinating article in the New Yorker magazine called "Jumpers." The article (by Tad Friend) describes "the fatal grandeur of the Golden Gate Bridge," documenting the fact that about 24 souls per year depart this world by jumping off.

People come from all over just to jump off the bridge. They fly from out of state, take busses or trains or drive. One of the reasons is that the bridge is an easy way to arrange your own suicide. The rail on the bridge's walkway is only 4 feet high and easily scalable by most adults. Anyone who wants can walk the bridge, find an appropriate place, climb the rail and jump.

The Bridge is a cheap, sure and easy way to end one's life, but there is apparently a kind of fatal romance about it too. One's final view of this world is usually one of beauty.

 Most jumpers do it on the side of the bridge facing the coast (the opposite side faces out to sea). The jumper can see Angel Island, Alacatraz Island, Treasure Island, and a Bay filled with sailboats and windsurfers. More people have committed suicide from the Bridge than anywhere else in the world.
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There is a 32 inch beam just behind the barrier that is known as "the chord." Often jumpers stand there for a few moments to get up their nerve. Beyond the chord there is only space and, 220 feet below, the Pacific Ocean. At that distance a body can accelerate to about 80 miles per hour in free fall. The impact generally shatters the rib cage or spine, exploding bone fragments through the internal organs of the heart, spleen, liver and lungs. The Coast Guard usually recovers the bodies but not all of them. Some are swept out to sea and never recovered, becoming food for the crabs. According to the television documentary "The Bridge," 24 people jumped to their deaths in 2004, three of whose bodies were never recovered.
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You can watch "The Bridge" on YouTube and it is touching and thought-provoking. Here's what the YouTube info says about it:

"The Bridge" is a 2006 documentary film by Eric Steel that tells the stories of a handful of individuals who committed suicide at the Golden Gate Bridge in 2004. The film was inspired by an article entitled "Jumpers," written by Tad Friend appearing in The New Yorker magazine in 2003.

The Bridge focuses on the large number of suicides that occur each year at the Golden Gate Bridge, capturing footage of the suicides and interviewing family members. Also interviewed are people who have attempted suicide at the bridge, witnesses of the suicides, and a jump survivor.

The movie was shot with multiple cameras pointed at a notorious suicide spot on the bridge during 2004. It captured 19 people as they took their final plunge, and then offers interviews with grieving families.

There are nine segments on YouTube, linked below in order to help you find them. I watched them all on Tuesday. I live near San Francisco and have been on the Golden Gate Bridge many times. The soft gray fog is cool and refreshing, the views spectacular. The film captures this and accentuates it with soft music, creating an almost meditative mood.
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I was particularly touched by a young thirty-something man with long, flowing hair, black sunglasses, a black leather jacket and black pants. His name was Gene Sprague and he was from San Jose, California.  The cameras caught him walking back and forth along the safety barrier for some time. Occasionally he paused by the barrier and appeared to be looking at the horizon, no doubt thinking about what he had come to do. I felt myself wishing I could have been there to try and talk him out of it.

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Finally, he climbs the barrier and stands on it, his back to the abyss. Then he gracefully falls backward off of the bridge (photo, above right), plunging downward. Another camera picks up the splash as he hits the Bay. The splash is violent, a tall geyser of white foam, followed by a lesser one seconds later. He does not reappear on the surface. He is dead. What a waste.
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Another segment of the film ends better. A man, Richard Waters of Pittsburgh, was walking the bridge and spies a young woman who has climbed over the barrier and is sitting on the chord, quietly staring at the watery depths below. At first Waters takes photographs of her and then realizes she is about to kill herself. He reaches over the barrier, grabs the collar of her coat and hoists her head first back over the barrier. She fights so he sits on her chest, using his cell phone to dial 911. Rescue personnel arrive quickly on the scene to take the woman away for psychiatric evaluation.
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I really admire private citizens who do heroic things on the spur of the moment. Richard Waters is a hero in my book.
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I do hope that anyone reading this, who is depressed or in psychic pain, to get help because a lot of people do care about you, whether you know it or not. Don't go over the Bridge. Death is permanent and irrevocable. Once you step off into space there is no changing your mind. Be a survivor, not a victim.

Someone did a study and discovered that, of the hundreds who have jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge, 28 have survived. All of them have said, that once they reached free fall, the first thing in their mind was "Oh God, I don't want to die."
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RELATED LINKS:

Here are the links to the YouTube videos of "The Bridge":

Segment 1

Segment 2

Segment 3

Segment 4

Segment 5

Segment 6

Segment 7

Segment 8

Segment 9
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Other links:

Related article from the U.K. Guardian, "Get Your Suicides Here Folks."

Related article from the U.K. Times Online, "The Bridge of Broken Dreams."

Related article from the U.K. Independent, "Bridge to Nowhere."

Suicide Prevention: If you are contemplating taking your own life, seek help.

Stephen King's "Duma Key"

I just read Stephen King's novel "Duma Key" and found it horrifically enjoyable. King always finds a seemingly plausible way for his characters to intersect the paranormal. In this novel the major character is Edgar Freemantle, a former construction contractor whose head is crushed in an accident; he also loses his right arm. His brain was damaged in a place called "the Broca's area," creating a "contracoup injury." He survives the injuries and goes to a small island off the Florida coast called Duma Key to recuperate.

To pass the time, Freemantle takes up sketching and painting and instantly begins turning out masterpieces. But his newfound talent, as well as the scenes he paints, somehow flow through his altered brain from the supernatural. His phantom right arm also gives him a connection to the other plane, and when the missing arm begins to itch, the only way to stop it is to paint. On Duma Key, a phantom limb is more than a medical phenomenon; it is a ghostly one as well.

I like fiction that allows us to imagine other planes, other dimensions, where human souls may go after physical death, or from where other spiritual entities dwell (some of them evil or malevolent). King does this very well. The evil spirit in "Duma Key" comes in the form of a china figure that is recovered from old ship wreckage in the surf, uncovered after a hurricane. The spirit's name is Perse and she is nasty and vicious to living souls. She kills people who cross her.

King does not explain how Perse came into existence or why she is antagonistic to humans. It really doesn't matter, however. When walking by a cemetery in the middle of the night, one doesn't generally worry about how malevolent spirits come to be; one only worries about avoiding them.

King's novels are entertainment, but for me they always seem to probe the boundaries of where everyday reality ends and the supernatural begins -- and that's what makes them fun.

"Dead Like Me" - a Compelling Television Series

"Dead Like Me" was one of my favorite television series. It ran only two seasons and was not picked up for a third. Too bad. I liked the stories concerning life and death and what it all means. The story line is about an 18 year old girl, Georgia Lass (played by Ellen Muth) who is killed on the first day of her first job -- by falling debris from a Russian space station. She then is chosen to be a "reaper" as in "grim reaper." Her duties in her new undead state is to walk among the living, harvesting souls that are assigned to her on high. But, she regrets her missed opportunities and she misses her family and sometimes breaks the rules to see her loved ones again.

Here is the first episode following the pilot film. Enjoy.

It's Not a Matter of Life and Death -- Or Maybe It Is

I started this blog to explore possible alternate realities -- not crazy moonbat stuff, like whether Bigfoot and Elvis got married and are now living in Boulder. No, not like that. However, dry skeptics bug me, the ones who deny that anything at all exists beyond the limits of their five senses. They are...BORING.

Although many of the themes I want to pursue here are often derived from eastern mysticism and philosophy, I am just a normal (sort of) American guy; I don't shave my head, burn incense, or wear saffron robes while chanting in the full lotus position. All that too is ritual and dogma, and I hate religious ritual and dogma because they are substitutes for thinking and the use of one's own intuition.

So don't be put off by the eastern symbols in my banner. I'll probably change that soon to something that more closely reflects who I am: someone who is intrigued with life and death and the barrier between, and what happens to those who cross over from the former to the latter.

Update:  I removed the eastern symbols for now.  I have also renamed the working blog name as "The Candle" as many will find "The Third Eye" a bit too hippy acid-rock 1969.

David Carradine: Death of a Shaolin Priest

David Carradine, a remarkable actor, died this past week by hanging himself in his Bangkok hotel room.  What a sad end for an actor whose role as a Shaolin Priest in the TV series Kung-Fu so inspired me in the 1970's.

I remember the first episode so well.  It was March of 1972, and that very day the Chinese girl that I was in love with told me that our love affair was over and that there would be no reconciliation.  Heartbroken, I turned on the TV and saw the first episode -- of a half Chinese boy who became a Shaolin Monk and learned, not only the art of self-defense, but many great spiritual truths as well.  Seeing the first episode, I wished that I might be like that Shaolin Monk, living with a calm soul and freed from the pain and bitterness of my failed romance.

As a young man freshly graduated from the monastery, Cane, as Carradine's character was called, killed a Chinese prince in retaliation for his murder of Master Po, Cane's mentor.  Cane then fled to America and the Old West, where he regularly encountered all kinds of low-lifes, putting them in their place with a few deft karate kicks and neck chops.  All the while, however, he was soft spoken and gentle, seeking a peaceful way if one was possible, resorting to force only to protect himself and the innocent.

What impressed me most about the Cane character was his spirituality, the calmness in his soul, his complete lack of the fear of death; how he never offended anyone's religious beliefs but afforded them the benefit of a doubt, knowing somehow that we are all brethren in the soul, all made of the same stuff, both flesh and spirit.

I always think of the Cane character as a sort of role model, even though he was fictional; a spiritual person who allowed the banality and turbulence of human existence to flow around him, as the river flows around a rock, neither consuming evil nor allowing himself to be consumed by it.  He was the tree that bends in a strong wind and so survives.

I will miss David Carradine and the beautiful images of courage, self-mastery and spirituality that his Cane character conveyed so convincingly.

The Near Death Experience: Spooky Tales or Proof of Life After Death?

Everyone has heard of the “near death experience,” or NDE for short. The NDE happens so often it is almost commonplace. The experience happens to people who suffer some accident or physical trauma that puts them at the point of death. It involves a feeling of leaving the body, of looking down at their own sleeping form from above. Some also see a bright light and experience moving through a long tunnel towards that light. It is common for NDE patients to have a “life review,” wherein they are made to remember the major events of their lives, the successes and the failures. They often meet a figure in white garments who greets them into the light, and tells them that their time is not yet, to return to the land of the living.

For most of us who hope there is life after death, such stories are comforting. However, they are “anecdotal,” that is, personal stories that cannot be evaluated scientifically or objectively.

I once worked with a woman in an accounting firm, whom I will call “Sandra,” who one day told me about her NDE. She had a miscarriage and something had gone wrong during her period of recuperation at home. During the night she hemorrhaged badly. Her husband was awakened by the warm pool of blood, and found his wife unconscious. Their mattress was soaked with blood. He quickly threw on some clothes and carried his unconscious wife to the car, then rushed her to the hospital.

He exited the car, trying to carry Sandra into the emergency room, when suddenly an ambulance driver saw him struggling and rushed over to help. The ambulance driver, a big, tall man, threw my friend over his shoulder and began running towards the emergency room door, slapping her legs as he did so to stimulate circulation. Sandra remembers the details well, even though she was unconscious. She watched it all happen just over the ambulance driver’s shoulder.

Sandra was wheeled quickly into a surgery room, where she watched the frantic doctors struggling to save her life. That is to say, she watched from the ceiling of the operating room, looking down on her own body and the doctors around her. Her husband tried to come in and the doctors pushed him out. As doctors shouted orders to nurses and transfusion equipment was hurriedly prepared, Sandra felt relaxed, comfortable and unworried. She was surprised by all the fuss, which she felt to be unnecessary.

Sandra did not travel through the tunnel towards a light like many others. She just awakened in her hospital bed and thought, “wow, that was weird!” Later, Sandra verified the details she remembered with her husband and the operating room doctors; the facts all checked out, i.e., they were not merely hallucinations.

A few years ago I read a book called “Closer to the Light: Learning From Near Death Experiences of Children,” by Dr. Melvin Morse, M.D. Dr. Morse treated some children who had nearly died, one by almost drowning in the family swimming pool. When he was examining the children following their recovery, they told him startling stories of a world beyond this one. He later got a research grant and studied the phenomenon in children.

Morse said he thought children would provide interesting data, as they are too young and innocent to be embarrassed by such experiences, and are less likely than adults to color these experiences with previous religious or cultural programming. The result was his fascinating book. I read the book right after my father died, and found it to be a great source of comfort and hope.

Amazon now lists many books on the Near Death Experience. One of the first, if not THE first book on the subject, was Raymond Moody’s “Life After Life.” Moody, if I remember correctly, was teaching at a university where the subject of NDE’s came up. He described the experience to his class and asked them how many of them knew someone who had experienced a NDE. A number of hands shot up. This intrigued Moody, a doctor, who began studying it in depth and eventually writing his ground-breaking book on the subject.

Moody concluded that there are nine experiences common to most people who have had a near death experience. These are:

hearing sounds such as buzzing
a feeling of peace and painlessness
having an out-of-body experience
a feeling of traveling through a tunnel
a feeling of rising into the heavens
seeing people, often dead relatives
meeting a spiritual being such as God
seeing a review of one’s life
feeling a reluctance to return to life

This is a topic I find fascinating.

More on Amazing Coincidence (Synchronicity)

A couple of years back I indulged a longtime interest in coincidences and bought two books on the subject. One was Incredible Coincidences, the Baffling World of Synchronicity by Alan Vaughan. The book was published in 1989 and is now out of print, so I had to buy it through used book dealers via Amazon.com. Alan Vaughan relates various true life strange coincidences in the book but also delves into the theory of coincidences, termed “synchronicity” by Psychologist Carl Jung. Synchronicity is basically meaningful coincidences that happen without cause, i.e. they are acausal. What is really interesting is the implications these phenomena point to, namely, that the human mind is capable of extrordinary things not fully understood, and that the nature of reality is not so cut-and-dried as we might think.

Vaughan’s tales of coincidences are interesting if not fascinating. For example, he tells of a woman in Berekely, California who is locked out of her house and wondering how to get in. Then the postman walks up and hands her a letter from her brother. Inside is a spare key.

A housewife loses her ring in a potato field. Forty years later she is cutting a potato and finds the ring inside.

Most coincidences are not startling, just interesting. The second book I read was What A Coincidence, the Wow Factor in Synchronicity by Susan Watkins. It was a book I found while browsing Amazon.com and sounded interesting, so I ordered it.

Susan relates a number of personal coincidences that are interesting but not necessarily astounding. She notes that coincidences seem to happen in clusters, or sometimes update themselves with the passage of time. As if to illustrate coincidences, she tells about her son Sean who rode a motorcycle (against her wishes). Interesting. I have a son Sean who rode a motorcycle and I nagged him regularly to give it up. Finally he did. Okay, that is not an earth shaking coincidence, just a mildly interesting one.

However, Susan tells of how her son Sean moved to San Francisco in 1989 and lived through the big earthquake that year. While he was there, she looked on a map and was surprised to see that there was a little town called Hollister south of San Francisco. She thought it significant, because she had lived on a street named Hollister. I thought it was pretty significant too, as I was sitting in my backyard in Hollister, California reading about Susan thinking about Hollister, California. She lives on the East Coast. Hollister is a small cow town with about 15,000 residents. It is not well known by any means. Okay Susan, you got my attention. What better way to teach coincidences than by demonstrating one?

We all have stories of coincidences that were meaningful to us. One of my most striking ones happened three years ago. I have a friend named Larry who lives in Gilroy, California. I had been helping him with his tax returns and negotiating with the IRS. Our efforts were difficult but successful. It was a big relief to both of us.

Two weeks later I flew to Seattle, Washington to begin a consulting assignment there. I got off the plane and walked to the rental car area where I was told to take the elevator down. However, I pushed the wrong button and went a floor further down than I should have. When the elevator doors opened, I walked out just as Larry was walking in. He cried, “Gary, what are you doing here?” I said “Larry???”

Larry was there to drop off a rental car after visiting relatives in Seattle. I was there to pick up a rental car. If I had not pushed the wrong elevator button, we would have missed each other completely. The fact that we were there, 800 miles from home, in the same spot at the same time was incredible. Neither of us knew the other would be in Seattle. What are the odds?

Another coincidence of the everyday variety involved my first son, Gary Jr. Gary used to drive a big rig truck up and down the west coast. Starting from northern Washington he would drive all the way to Los Angeles and back. One morning he was driving through the Bay Area and called me on his cell phone. We were yakking it up when Gary asked me where I was. I told him I was stopped at a light at the intersection of Highway 25 and 156. He said, “I’m approaching that intersection now.” I couldn’t see in his direction, as there was a large Pepsi truck on my right side blocking my view of Highway 156. I told Gary, “There’s a big Pepsi truck on my right side.” He replied, “I see it!” Then WHOOSH! His big rig went speeding through the intersection and we saw each other just for a second as he sped out of sight. “I saw you!” he exclaimed. “I saw you too!” I replied.

This was another interesting and meaningful coincidence. Gary Jr. drives a route of 1,500 miles and finds me at the same intersection for a split second in the morning of a workday. If I’d left the house five minutes earlier or five minutes later, we would have missed each other.

I love coincidences and synchronicity. They are like chili peppers in the gruel of life.

Zen and the Art of Happiness

Lately I have noticed that the books I read have a common thread that runs through them all. That thread is an acknowledgement of the infinite power and nature of the Universe. Robert Ringer and Napoleon Hill have described it as the “cosmic catalyst” or “infinite intelligence,” and both described how it can be harnessed for great benefit, particularly material success in life.

The thread also shoots through other books and other topics. Dr. Richard Maurice Bucke wrote a whole book on the mystical experience, i.e. the moment of spiritual realization when mortal man can catch a glimpse of the infinite, his own immortal nature and the interconnectedness of all things. Alan Vaughan and Susan M. Watkins wrote books on synchronicity, which seem to support this interconnectedness, manifested through amazing coincidences in the lives of ordinary people.

I may be wrong, but I see a Zen connection in all of this. Zen is a way of thought and meditation that focuses on the universe, the laws of nature and man’s relationship to them. It seeks to know the essence of man’s nature and his universe and to live in harmony with both. It is not a religion but it is a philosophy. So I ordered my first book on Zen, called Zen and the Art of Happiness by Chris Prentiss. I found it enjoyable and wise. Once again, I saw the thread of this common theme running through it.

Some of the book’s sections bear such compelling titles as What’s True in the Universe, a Change in Outlook, Freedom from the Tyranny of Events, and Healing Your Past. Prentiss even discusses one of my favorite topics, amazing coincidences, calling them the Language of the Universe. Prentiss says that such events have led him to the conclusion that the Universe is both alive and aware and that it communicates with us continuously, though some communications are more obvious than others. This thought provided me with insight into the term “conscious of consciousness.” Let me explain.

A few posts back I wrote about the mystical experience of Harold W. Percival, who described his M.E. as being “conscious of Consciousness.” He wrote “I was conscious of Consciousness as the Ultimate and Absolute Reality….It would be futile to attempt description of the sublime grandeur and power and order and relation in poise of what I was then consicous. Twice during the next fourteen years, for a long time on each occasion, I was conscious of Consciousness.”

Frankly, I didn’t know what Percival meant at the time, but now I think I do. He became aware of the great Conscious Mind that permeates the Universe and all things within it. This ties in nicely with Prentiss’s observation that the Universe is both alive and aware. Whether you want to call this universal mind God or something else, it doesn’t really matter. Naming things usually only serves to limit them.

In his book, Chris Prentiss discussed an ancient Chinese sage known as Lao Tzu, who lived 2500 years ago. Lao Tzu wrote a book of 81 verses that became known as the Tao Te Ching. Tzu’s writings also seek to understand and live in harmony with the natural order. The Tao Te Ching is the most widely translated Chinese work of all time. Okay, that’s interesting, but not enough to get me to buy a book on it. Unless, that is, I happened to come upon one while browsing the book section at Costco while my wife shopped. I found one by Dr. Wayne Dyer on the subject of the Tao Te Ching yesterday and, interpreting it as a message from the Universe, bought it.

The thread continues. I am on the path.

The Strange Near Death Experience of Bert Huffman

Bert Huffman was a friend of mine who shared my interest in Civil War history. We were both Confederate reenactors for the National Civil War Association in San Jose, California. In 1990, the NCWA put on a battle reenactment at Roaring Camp, near Scotts Valley, California. After a reenacted battle, Bert suffered a major heart attack and collapsed on the field. A doctor stepped out of the audience and saved Bert’s life, and later the TV series “Rescue 911″ made an episode about Bert.

After Bert had recovered, I met him at the Hofbrau restaurant off Saratoga Avenue in San Jose for lunch. While we were dining, he confessed to me that he had had a bizarre near death experience while unconscious at Roaring Camp. Fortunately, I keep a journal and recorded his story. Here it is, from the pages of my journal.

Thursday, September 27, 1990: I had lunch with my good friend Bert Huffman today. He is the Captain of the First Virginia Infantry re-enactors regiment of the National Civil War Association, the same regiment of which I also am a member. At the Roaring Camp event last May, Bert suffered a major heart attack right after the first battle and collapsed as the regiments were lining up in front of the spectators, the time after the battles when our commanders give little speeches to the crowd. CPR was administered on the field by some of the people present, and a doctor appeared from the crowd to open an airway; finally electrodes were brought in to shock Bert’s heart into beating again. Clinically, he “died” on the field, becoming a “flatliner” (see my entry of September 19). He “died” twice more in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. His doctor later told him he had “one hell of a constitution” to survive such a major heart attack.

Anyway, today as we were having lunch and discussing NCWA business, he suddenly started telling me about this weird experience he had when he collapsed. With a shock, I realized he was describing a “near death” experience. Bert said he had only told the story to his psychologist, and had  not told it to anyone else for fear of ridicule. But as he lay unconscious on the field, he suddenly rose out of his body and was suspended in air, hovering over it. He looked down and saw his body on the ground. There was no pain, and he  felt perfectly comfortable and at peace. Then he looked to the horizon at a hilltop, and a white mist was pouring down out of the sky over the hilltop. Then he saw a white buffalo running in the air, just over the mist, headed straight at him. It got closer and closer, then lowered its head as if it were going to scoop Bert up with its horns; but when it got close to Bert, it suddenly veered away to Bert’s left, ran about 30 or 40 feet, and looked back at Bert over its shoulder. The mist then began ascending back into the sky, and the buffalo followed it, disappearing from sight.

Bert’s psychologist, James Boyers, was amazed at the story. Boyers’ girlfriend is a full blood Cheyenne Indian, and as it turns out, Bert is 50% Cherokee Indian. Boyers informed Bert that a white buffalo is the same thing as the angel of death to Indians; they call it “great grandfather”, and a white buffalo is sacred to them. Boyers went back to South Dakota with his girlfriend and related Bert’s tale to the Cheyenne medicine men. They said that “great grandfather” did not take Bert’s soul because the spirit has plans for him on earth. They also told Boyers that very few have seen the white buffalo and returned to tell about it. They then smoked the medicine pipe with Boyers in celebration of Bert’s recovery and gave the pipe to Boyers to bring back for Bert to smoke, to complete the ritual. Bert did so, with Boyers, in his office. Bert was unaware of the meaning of the white buffalo prior to this near death experience.

When Bert started telling me this, I said, “Bert, what you are describing is a near death experience. Wait a minute, let me write this down.” Then I started scribbling notes on the back of a piece of paper, which became the above journal entry. I asked Bert if he had seen the movie, “Flatliners.” He said that he had not. Then I told him I had something I wanted to show him, and went to my car to get my binder with my journal in it. I had him read my entry of September 19, as well as the newspaper article that accompanies it. The article describes research being done on children who have had a near death experience, and the seemingly supernatural experiences they describe are strikingly similar and consistent. Bert said he agrees that “death is nothing to fear.” I asked Bert, since he had told almost no one about this experience, why did he suddenly decide to tell me? He said he didn’t know. I told him that I think our souls somehow communicate beyond the limitations of our physical existence, and that this may explain amazing coincidences, so-called “synchronicity”, and mental telepathy. Somehow, in some unexplained way, he knew that it was right to tell me, almost as if he knew that I am interested and have an open mind about the “great beyond”, and that his tale would be heard by sympathetic ears.

***

Back to the present.   About a year later, Bert died of a stroke. Perhaps he rode to Heaven on the back of the White Buffalo. In any case, I believe he is now with God.

Amazing Coincidences – Random Chance or Cosmic Connection?

As I mentioned in my previous post, some believe that everything in the universe is interconnected, and that this interconnection may explain many amazing coincidences.  I love to read about such coincidences, as they stir my sense of wonder and make me aware of the miraculous. 

Two of my favorite amazing coincidences are these:

Swapped Hotel Finds

In 1953, television reporter Irv Kupcinet was in London to cover the coronation of Ellizabeth II. In one of the drawers in his room at the Savoy he found found some items that, by their identification, belonged to a man named Harry Hannin. Coincidentally, Harry Hannin – a basketball star with the famed Harlem Globetrotters – was a good friend of Kupcinet’s. But the story has yet another twist. Just two days later, and before he could tell Hannin of his lucky discovery, Kupcinet received a letter from Hannin. In the letter, Hannin told Kucinet that while staying at the Hotel Meurice in Paris, he found in a drawer a tie – with Kupcinet’s name on it! (Mysteries of the Unexplained)

Paging Mr. Bryson

While on a business trip sometime in the late 1950s, Mr. George D. Bryson stopped and registered at the Brown Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky. After signing the register and being given his key to room 307, he stopped by the mail desk to see if any letters had arrived for him. Indeed there was a letter, the mail girl told him, and handed him an envelope addressed to Mr. George D. Bryson, room 307. This wouldn’t be so odd accept the letter was not for him, but for room 307’s just-previous occupant – another man named George D. Bryson. (Incredible Coincidence, Alan Vaughan)

You can read more examples at the following link.  

Now how could everything be interconnected?  To the human eye, it seems not to be so.  People and things are separate, are they not?  Well yes and no.  All of existence is really an atomic/electrical field of countless atoms and molecules.  What seems solid and separate to us is really a cloud of electromagnetic particles and charges.  How energy travels back and forth through the field is not fully understood.  What seems to be supernatural or paranormal phenomena may simply be natural processes working themselves out.

To Get What You Want: Tap Into the Universal Power Source

Author Robert Ringer often writes about a power in the universe that can be tapped by humans for their benefit. Ringer claims that the power of thought combined with action produces a kind of telepathy. This telepathy “brings a person in contact with the people, things and circumstances that he needs to accomplish his objectives.” It matters not whether the objectives are professional success, finding love or excelling in a sport or a musical instrument. This force can be used to increase one’s chances of getting what he wants.

Ringer indicates that this power, which he calls the “Cosmic Catalyst,” is more than just physical cause-and-effect, but that it has a metaphysical quality too. He believes that all things in the universe are interconnected, something I have believed instinctively for years, and the power of this connection is energized by action, particularly bold action, which can make the desired results appear in one’s life, sometimes at astonishing speed.

This interconnectedness of all things may be the cause of the amazing coincidences that we all experience from time to time. You lift the receiver to call your son and before you can dial, you hear him saying, “hello, hello?” You then realize that you lifted the phone just as he was calling you, even before the phone had a chance to ring. Has that ever happened to you? It has to me.

This mental power has been described by other authors too, like Claude Bristol who wrote the classic self-help book, “The Magic of Believing.” I believe Bristol called it “the Universal Mind.” Napoleon Hill, author of another classic “Think and Grow Rich” also described it. Hill indicated that the great captains of industry, those who built the oil companies, the steel mills and the great railroads in the 19th century also believed in this force.

Many of us might refer to this power source as God, but the force , like electricity, even works for atheists if they are smart enough to use it. There is an old Zen saying that goes: “When the student is ready, the Master will appear.” I think this saying reflects the use of this power. Along the same lines, Napoleon Hill said, “When you’re ready for a thing, it will make its appearance.”

Are you ready for more money? For a new love? For a home of your own?

Use this force for your own benefit. And may the Force be with you!

Pre-Death Visions

Several months ago I reread Dr. Melvin Morse’s book, “Closer to the Light,” about the near death experience in children.  Dr. Morse researched the phenomenon in Seattle around 1990 and came up with a number of interesting cases.  Two different children told him that in the next world they could “double jump.” 

One of the chapters deals with “pre-death visions,” the visions the dying have before they enter the near-death state.  Dr. Morse gives several accounts of dying people seeing dead relatives who come to comfort them or escort them to the next world.  One dying boy told him that he had visited a crystal castle where he met several of his fellow patients who had died before him.  The dying have reported seeing angels, God, and other people who enter their bedrooms to talk to them.

I know of only one person who has had pre-death visions, and that was my own father.  In the weeks before he died, my father told my brother and sister-in-law (with whom he lived) that he kept seeing “people, out of the corners of my eyes.”  Once, when they were watching television together, my father asked my sister-in-law:  “Do you see them?  Do you see those people standing by the fireplace?”  Another time he told her, “I’m seeing those people out of the corners of my eyes again.”

My brother and sister-in-law took my father to the doctor for an EEG (a brain scan).  Nothing unusual was found.

My father died within weeks after these visions.  I have always wondered if they were delusions or actual visitors from the next world, waiting to escort him over the threshhold.  I’m probably a credulous fool, but I tend to believe it was the latter.

Silence: the Voice of God?

I read somewhere that “silence is the voice of God.” I believe it.

A year ago I was taking a walk through some fields filled with yellow grass stubble. It was Fall and there is something about Fall that I always notice but never verbalized before. Fall has a kind of quietness to it, as if all sound is somehow muted. It’s as if nature itself is listening for something, watching and waiting. This always brings a feeling of peace to my soul.

We all hear about the “still, small voice within.” In fact, many philosopers believe that this voice within is God’s usual means of communicating with us. I think we best hear the voice during moments of quietude, when we listen not just with our ears but with our hearts. I guess that’s why there is so much spiritual benefit in meditation. It is the process by which the active and noisy mind is quieted, allowing a higher voice to be heard.

Neale Donald Walsch’s “Conversations With God” Book 1

I read Book 1 of Neale Donald Walsch’s “Conversations With God.” I had started it some months ago, decided it was boring and quit reading.  However, I became intrigued by the boiling anger the book generates in some Christians, so decided to give it another go. 

The book actually became interesting as I got more into the text.  I read some things that were almost profound; other things that were interesting; and some things that I thought were just plain dumb.  Nothing that I read was really earth-shaking.   In general, Walsch’s God (hereinafter referred to as “WG”) simply rehashed a lot of existing philosophy and religious beliefs.  Some of these beliefs come from Christianity or Judaism (the so-called “Abrahamic” faiths) and some came from Buddism, Hinduism or Taoism (the so-called “Brahmic” faiths).  The rest came from Walsch himself.

I will give Walsch a lot of credit for starting a new conversation, if not with God, about God and our concepts of the divine and the infinite.  The danger in this is that it will draw a lot of anger from devout religionists, who already have “the truth” and don’t want it messed with.  They see any new examination into the nature of God as blasphemy and the work of the devil.  I, however, have an open mind.  I think it is a healthy exercise to brush several millennia of dust from ancient religious texts and to reexamine their premises.  Man’s ideas about science, government, business, art and other aspects of culture have continued to evolve over the centuries.  It is only our concepts of the infinite that are fixed and static and not allowed to grow.

I will largely paraphrase what WG says in the book, in order to save space.  Here are some of the things I found intriguing:

1.  WG is pantheistic.  That means that everything is God.  God is not separate from his creation; he is the universe and everything in it.  It means that human beings are part of God and not separate from him.  We are a finite expression of the infinite.  WG doesn’t always do a good job of explaining this, at one point stating that we humans are “Gods.”  That won’t sit well with many readers.  Personally, I don’t have the lightning bolt thing down pat yet.

2.  You existed before this life.  When you took physical form in this world, you caused yourself to forget who you really are.  While in this world of form, your major spiritual quest is to remember and recreate who you really are.

3.  Death is no big deal.  It is failure to doctors, tragedy to those left behind, but relief and release to the soul.  The soul is clear that there is no great tragedy about leaving the body.   We are all immortal right now; immortality is not something you have to earn by following a religious script; we never do die, we only change form.

4.  God is not the vengeful, punitive God that many Jews, Christians and Muslims believe.  There is no Hell.

5.  Souls can reincarnate many times, be born into this world many times.  The decision to do this is made by the soul itself, so it can continue to grow.  Karma is not an obligation of the soul, but an opportunity of the soul to continue to grow, looking at past events and experiences as a measure of that growth.  [This contradicts eastern beliefs that karma is a debt of the soul to be repaid by successive lives on earth.  I like the original concept better.]

6.  Don’t envy someone who is very fortunate nor overly pity someone less fortunate.  “Judge not, then, the karmic path walked by another.  Envy not success, nor pity failure, for you know not what is success or failure in the soul’s reckoning.”  [I found this an interesting concept - that one's lot in life was chosen by his own soul for its own spiritual growth.]

7.  Killing is evil, killing for God is the highest blasphemy.  However, you are not to be either a victim or a martyr; war is sometimes necessary and you have a moral obligation to prevent aggression against others and yourself.

8.  The purpose of life is joy.  WG says “Life should be a joy, a celebration…Four fifths of the world’s people consider life a trial, a tribulation, a time of testing, a karmic debt that must be repaid, a school with harsh lessons that must be learned, and, in general, an experience to be endured while awaiting the real joy, which is after death.”  [I agree with this.  Anything that destroys joy, including various religious beliefs, should be excised and thrown out as rubbish.]

9.  Money is good, not evil, not “the root of all evil.”  Being rich is good – there is nothing spiritually advantageous about poverty and want.

10.  Sex is one of man’s highest joys.  It is not shameful or evil.  Being attracted to the opposite sex is not “committing adultery in your heart,” it is following the dictates of nature that were programmed into us to procreate the human race.

These are some of the ideas I found interesting and worthy of futher study and discussion.  There are others but this will suffice for now.

Some of the ideas of WG that I didn’t like or accept are these:

1.  Man is the greatest source of harm to nature and the environment.  Nonsense; man is part of nature and man’s imprint on nature, for good or bad, is negligible.

2.  Man could immediately end world hunger and cure disease in an instant if he really wanted to.  Balderdash.  This is moon-battery of the worst order.

3.  Man could end war if he really wanted to – all we have to do, all we have ever had to do, is to agree.  Ri-i-i-ght.  All we have to do is reconcile many different cultures, religions, political systems, philosophies and world-views and we can begin beating our swords into plowshares.  When did any two humans ever agree on anything?  This comment is just plain dumb.

4.  There is no such thing as evil – even Hitler went to Heaven.  I have a lot of trouble with this one.  WG implies that there are no consequences for mass murder, tyranny, cruelty and oppression.  Although I do not believe in the vengeful and punitive God nor do I believe in Hell, I find it unjust that Hitler, or others like  him, can merely skate on into paradise at the end of their lives.  Here’s where the older version of karma makes sense – where Hitler may redeem himself through many more lives on earth, experiencing the same horrors he visited upon others, or mitigating such punishment through better deeds.

Conclusions:  Walsch’s book is worth a read.   It does reexamine some religious concepts that need reconsideration.  It should not be considered a religious text or a new religion, nor should it be viewed as a literal expression of God’s mind.  If it helps you along the path to enlightenment and spiritual growth, that’s a good thing, but don’t take it literally.  Reexamining one’s religious beliefs is not a bad thing – it is necessary for your own spiritual growth.

Here’s a quote I found on the web.  I think it says a lot that is related to this post:

God builds his temple in the heart on the ruins of churches and religions.  -Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)

Here’s another relevant quote:

We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes. – Gene Roddenberry

Dick Cavett in the NY Times Discusses an Amazing Coincidence

Here's a story from today's New York Times, by Dick Cavett, about synchronicity, or his own personal amazing coincidence.  It's called "Seriously, What Are the Odds?"

Hat tip:  Teapots Happen

Dead Uncle Fred

I have often wondered if the living can communicate with the dead, and vice versa.  

Carl Jung, the famous analytical psychologist, was very interested in life after death and other spiritual topics.  In his writings he told of a friend who had died and who seemed to contact Jung after death.  Jung said he had a strong inner vision of the man; it was not an apparition or ghost, but merely a strong mental impression.   I had a similar experience when my Uncle Fred passed away.  He was a simple everyday man who was friendly and spiritual.   There was nothing extraordinary about Fred but he seems to have a talent for conveying after-death messages.

When Uncle Fred died, I went to a memorial service at his church.  Just as I walked into the church, I suddenly had a strong inner vision of Fred.  It was so real that I gave it particular notice, and did not summarily dismiss it as a meaningless fantasy.  I saw Uncle Fred's face and it was smiling broadly and he said to me, "It's everything we could have hoped for!"  He was referring to life after death.  I accepted this communication as real.

After the church service, my mother and I went outside and were looking towards the church when suddenly I noticed a very strange cloud overhead.  It was expanding outwards in all directions and was filled with light.  My mother said, "Oh look, it seems to be a message from Fred that he's all right!"  I replied, "I was thinking the same thing."

Later, when discussing the incident with my mother, she stated that she had not seen the lighted cloud but was referring to a white dove that suddenly landed on the cross atop the church.  Apparently, we were both looking at different phenomena at the very same moment and drawing the very same conclusions:  Uncle Fred was giving us a sign that he was okay.

Intrigued, I wondered if it were possible for someone dead to arrange visual phenomena in such a way as to convey messages to the living.  I was thinking about this one morning on the way to work, and I said to Uncle Fred, "Okay, Uncle Fred.  If that was you communicating to us, give me another sign and I will believe you."

At that moment, a car on my right pulled ahead of me and I could clearly see its personalized license plate.  It read UNC FRED.  I could feel the hair standing up on the back of my neck.

The Mystical Experience: Direct Knowledge of God

Can you know God through the workings of your own mind?  Or do you need an agent, a religious leader, or a book of ancient scriptures to get you there? 

The answers are:  yes, you can know God directly through something called “mysticism.”  No, you don’t need to have an agent or intermediary or ancient book to get you there.  The direct knowledge of God occurs to some people as a flash of insight that is very powerful and thrilling.  This flash of insight is called “the mystical experience.”  

I never thought about it much, but I suppose I am a mystic.  I have had the mystical experience three times in my life.  Each experience happened to me in my youth, while I was earnestly seeking to know God and while I was discussing God with other young men.  However, the most powerful of the three happened to me in June of 1964.  At the time it happened to me, I had never heard of mysticism or the mystical experience.  I only knew that I had experienced something extraordinary, something profound. Some background:  when I was 19 years of age, I was acutely aware of my mortality and horrified at the thought of death.  I had begun a search to find the truth about God, whether or not He existed, and if He did, what He wanted from human beings.  Was there an after life?  What did you have to do to get there? 

In June of 1964, two church buddies accompanied me and my younger brother on a camping trip.  The four of us went to Seacliff, California, where we camped in a tent overlooking the Pacific ocean.  One night we went down to the beach after the sun had set and noticed that the white caps of the incoming tide were no longer white – they were glowing in a beautiful, luminescent blue.  Since I was a biology major at the time, I knew the glowing light was caused by unicellular organisms in the surf, either dynoflagellates or diatoms.  These one-celled marine animals glowed in royal blue, causing the tide to glow blue from their teeming millions.  When we walked on the wet beach, a circle of blue sparkles would erupt around each footstep. It was like walking through sapphires. We were in awe of nature’s beauty.

We sat on a dune overlooking the incoming tide of blue light, looking up at the sky and the moon and the stars.  We began to talk about God and whether He had a plan for man.  That’s when it happened to me.  Suddenly the mortal veil slipped from my eyes and I instantly perceived the divine nature of the universe.  In that moment, all doubt about the existence of a supreme being vanished completely.  God was no longer an abstract idea, but an indisputable fact.  

This cosmic insight lasted only a few moments, but in those moments I perceived and understood eternity, the interrelationship of all things and the fact that there is no death.  I perceived a large multitude of people standing in a far away plain, the people who have died, and was relieved to know that men like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin live on.  In those brief moments I lost all fear of death.  I realized that I was as important in the grand scheme as the largest stars or suns, that I existed for a reason.  It was a thrilling revelation and all human fear, doubt and cynicism were burned away by the divine light that flooded my mind. 

I did not feel that I had some kind of magical experience, or that I had learned something new.  I felt as if I had learned something I already knew, but had forgotten.  I felt that this divine truth was always in front of me, but that somehow I couldn’t see it.  For whatever reason, the door to my soul had opened briefly to allow in the light.

I was 19 years old.  I didn’t have a clue what had happened to me, or that the same experience happens to other people too.  I went to bed in my tent that night, listening to the surf crash against the sandy shore, and slept very soundly until morning.

It wasn’t until a few months later that I found out my flash of insight is called “the mystical experience.”  I learned it in a class in philosophy that I took at San Jose State.  My teacher, a Buddhist, told me that there are religious sects in the Far East that spend all their time trying to experience what I had experienced.  These schools of thought constitute something called “Myticism.” They call my kind of experience ”attaining enlightenment,” or “achieving nirvana.”  It was amazing to me: I had the experience and I didn’t even have to go on a diet of bean curd and goat’s milk!  I didn’t have to burn incense or wear saffron robes or shave my head or sit in the full lotus position.  What many eastern monks spend a lifetime trying to experience, I had experienced, with no real effort.  I felt blessed. 

Electronic Voice Phenomenon (EVP) - Ghosts Caught on Tape?

A few years back a movie came out with the title of "White Noise." White noise is the sound of static, or other sounds with a variety of patterns. Good examples of white noise are these: the sounds of rain, wind in the trees, surf crashing on a beach, a water fountain. There have been cases of people listening to "white noise" on electronic recording devices and hearing what appear to be human voices. Some have concluded that these voices are those of disincarnates, or ghosts.

My older brother became interested and began making recordings that he would then analyze and augment with sound software, and discovered several of these voices. It scared the hell out of him. I will tell his story in a future post.

Meanwhile, watch this documentary video that gives the history and background of this phenomenon -- called "Electronic Voice Phenomenon, or EVP.

The Mystical Experience, Described by Others

Note:  To understand this post I suggest that you first read the prior article above this one.  It explains what the mystical experience is and why it is significant.

This past week I spent a lot of time reading “Cosmic Consciousness,” by Richard Maurice Bucke.  Bucke was an M.D. who had the mystical experience when he was 36 years old.  The experience never repeated itself, but Bucke was so moved by the experience that he decided to research the mystical experience and write a book about others who have had it.  His book was published in 1901.

Bucke wrote of both famous and ordinary people who have had a mystical experience, or as he put it, attained “cosmic consciousness.”  He includes in his study people like Walt Whitman, Plotinus, Socrates, Balzac and others.  Some of these people wrote better descriptions of the experience than others.  I plan to post some of them here.  The best place to start, no doubt, is with Dr. Bucke’s own personal mystical experience.  He writes (describing his experience in the third person):

It was in the early spring at the beginning of his thirty-sixth year.  He and two friends had spent the evening reading Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, Browning, and especially Whitman. They parted at midnight, and he had a long drive in a hansom (it was in an English city). His mind deeply under the influences of the ideas, images and emotions called up by the reading and talk of the evening, was calm and peaceful. He was in a state of quiet, almost passive enjoyment.  All at once, without warning of any kind, he found himself wrapped around as it were by a flame colored cloud. For an instant he thought of fire, some sudden conflagration in the great city, the next he knew that the light was within himself.  Directly afterwards came upon him a sense of exultation, of immense joyousness, accompanied or immediately followed by an intellectual illumination quite impossible to describe. Into his brain streamed one momentary lightning-flash of the Brahmic Splendor which has ever since lightened his life; upon his heart fell one drop of Brahmic Bliss, leaving thenceforward for always an after taste of heaven.

Among other things…he saw and knew that the Cosmos is not dead matter but a living Presence, that the soul of man is immortal, that the universe is so built and ordered that without any peradventure all things work together for the good of each and all, that the foundation principle of the world is what we call love and that the happiness of every one is in the long run absolutely certain.  He claims that he learned more within the few seconds during which the illumination lasted that in previous months or even years of study, and that he learned much that no study could ever have taught.

The illumination itself continued not more than a few moments, but its effects proved ineffaceable; it was impossible for him ever to forget what he at that time saw and knew, neither did he, or could he, ever doubt the truth of what was then presented to his mind.

Robert Ringer, in his book “Action,” also talks about the mystical experience and cites one described by Harold W. Percival, who in his book “Thinking and Destiny” wrote:

From November of 1892 I passed through astonishing and crucial experiences, following which, in the spring of 1893, there occured the most extraordinary event of my life.  I had crossed 14th Avenue, in New York City.  Cars and people were hurrying by.  

While stepping up to the northeast corner curbstone, Light, greater than that of myriads of suns opened in the center of my head.  In that instant or point, eternities were apprehended.  There was no time.  Distance and dimensions were not in evidence….I was conscious of Consciousness as the Ultimate and Absolute Reality….It would be futile to attempt description of the sublime grandeur and power and order and relation in poise of what I was then consicous.  

Twice during the next fourteen years, for a long time on each occasion, I was conscious of Consciousness.  But during that time I was conscious of no more than I had been conscious of it in that first moment.

See my description of my own mystical experience in the previous post below.