At first, my scientist’s brain discounted the experience as a hallucination, merely the consequence of a sound crack on the head and loss of consciousness. But, I soon discovered, it was the beginning of another form of consciousness that would prove to be more valuable than any career, status, or fringe benefits.
My head hurt too much to listen to music, read, go to the movies, or exercise—all the forms of relaxation I had previously enjoyed. Trapped in a fit body with a sorely pounding head and a physician-imposed three weeks at home, I was utterly bored. When I had recovered enough to drive, I went downtown to Seattle’s waterfront area to visit my favorite bookstore, Elliot Bay Books. Creaking wooden floors and the aroma from decades of books comforted my senses.
I was walking slowly along the rows of shelves, browsing the titles, when a gook nearly jumped into my hands. It was Ray Moody’s Life After Life: The Investigation of a Phenomenon—Survival of Bodily Death, and it contained page after page of detailed near-death experiences. I purchased the book, and reading it forced me to look closely at the evidence presented by the many others who had experiences similar to mine. I could no longer dismiss what had happened to me. Wonder and curiosity began replacing my grouchy self-pity at having a wounded skull.
Another man named Ray, a podiatrist, showed up in my life. Trained by the Super Learning group at Ohio State University, Ray taught memory skills via deep relaxation and visualization techniques. Don’t ask what this had to do with feet! Seemingly unrelated to my recent experience, I embarked on memory training to help keep authors and citations straight in my work as a publishing scientist.
In our session one day, I reclined in a big, comfortable chair in Ray’s office, listening to a tape describing in detail the features of a small, gray kitten. I was a little surprised when, in my mind’s eye, I saw myself walking around a room looking at specific things: a chair with blue velvet upholstery, a fireplace that was open on two sides into the room, and pictures on the wall. Even more surprising was the look on Ray’s face when I described the room. We were both astonished when I described with precise detail the setting in which he had produced the memory tape. Put two scientists together and you launch a truth-seeking mission. We decided to discover how my inner sight worked in a real-time situation. I would go to Ray’s office and relax in the big chair, and after we had chatted for a while, Ray would go down the hall and examine one of his podiatry patients. When he returned, I could tell him details about the person’s foot, the pathology, and anything else that had caught his attention during the examination.
We also established an informal mini-study in mind reading. Ray would think about a particular color as he walked to the room where I was waiting, and my head would be filled with that exact color. I was not guessing. I saw the color accurately every time. My view of myself as a levelheaded, rational scientist became unhinged. Perhaps you, too, have had some unusual experiences that scared you, at first, and then opened you to far-reaching possibilities in your life.
Joyce Whiteley Hawkes, Cell-Level Healing: The Bridge from Soul to Cell (Atria Paperback, 2006).
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