Well okay then! The 2006 AA-EVP conference is now a historical event. We received a number of comments observing that the gathering of speakers and attendees was inspired and represented an important event in the world of EVP/ITC. Of course, we are happy for the compliments, but now it is time to assess the results and look for ways to plan future efforts.

The AA-EVP is a nonprofit, educational organization with an emphasis on education. The conference effectively facilitated the Association’s responsibility to teach, but the way it was effective may surprise you. Those of you who were able to attend had a world-class opportunity to learn about ITC research, but the most important benefit of the conference was the collaboration amongst attendees and presenters. Many of you have become highly qualified ITC experimenters, and your personal knowledge about these things is simply not available in the university classroom. It is all about collaboration, and the conference has proven to be a most important venue for collaboration, which we expect will lead to fresh ideas and new progress in the field of ITC for years to come.

We wish to thank those who volunteered and helped make the conference a success. A special thanks to Carol Peterson and Jim Stonier. Both helped with the big rush of registration on Thursday evening and Jim helped bring order to technology chaos on the conference room floor. Thank you Vicki Talbott for helping with registration on Saturday.

Martha Copeland and Ginny Sawyer are responsible for the outstanding conference location. They previewed possible conference sites in 2005. Many attendees commented on how beautiful the rooms and the hotel were.

George Wynne donated several lovely flower arrangements to grace the stage and registration table. He also helped as interpreter for Paolo Presi. Garrett Husveth took Sonia Rinaldi under his wing, making her stay more productive and less stressful. We thank Becky Estep for helping Sarah participate in the conference and she in turn wished to thank Al Rauber for being there for them. We would have no pictures to show you if not for Jim and Becky making sure that we had some.

We also want to acknowledge a large donation that came during the first day from Denise Herres. The donation helped the conference break even. Denise simply handed us the check and said it was important that there would be more conferences.

A web page will soon be set up with more detailed information about the presentations. Here is an overview.

"EVP 101" is the title of the workshop we teach, and what we presented in a shortened version Thursday night. Should we decide to teach an "Instructor Certification Course," EVP 101 would be in the core suite of lessons.

The Friday morning opening comments were especially important to Tom, because he managed to surprise Lisa with a new HP Palm Pilot, which would replace her often folded yellow paper "Personal Data Assistant." Tom pointed out in the presentation that the conference would not have taken place were it not for Lisa’s initiative and hard work. Debbie Caruso was a fellow conspirer in helping Tom surprise Lisa.

Sarah Estep presented a brief introduction about her experience with EVP and then some of her best EVP examples were played, ending with a one minute EVP containing music thought to have been originated by Ludwig Beethoven. At the conclusion of the presentation, Sarah was given a Lifetime Achievement Award.

Sonia Rinaldi described her work with EVP/ITC, in which she uses a computer and a video camera operating in a mirrored mode. We were all fascinated by the faces she is finding in the optical noise, as they are unlike any we are seeing from other researchers.

Laurie Monroe brought the attendees up to date about how The Monroe Institute is learning to apply Hemi-Sync technology to improving human potential. One slide in particular seems to tell The Monroe Institute story: "The Monroe Institute proposes to introduce, at all levels of human endeavor, an ability of mental and spiritual functioning that will constructively change humankind’s direction and destiny."

Paolo Presi presented the work of IL Laboratorio. To our knowledge, this is the only organization in the world that is organized and dedicated to the study of trans-etheric phenomena with the use of clinical/forensic quality tools. His detailed presentation illustrated how the voices of EVP might sound like the voice of the person while still in the physical, but that the formation of the voice is sometimes impossible to produce with a human voice apparatus. On a similar note, he also described how face recognition software is able to help certify that the face found in transcommunication is the same as the face of the person while in the physical.

Paolo Presi later translated the documentary video of Marcello Bacci, the man who continues to conduct two-way, real-time communication with people on the other side with a short wave radio. Bacci even brings family members into his home to speak with their discarnate loved ones.

Mark Macy gave us an overview of some of the astounding communications that occurred in Europe during the late part of last decade. This included reports of telephone conversations he has had with Konstantin Raudive after Raudive’s transition. Mark uses a device known as a "Luminator" to take ITC pictures. The device is believed to modify the subtle energy environment near it, and was initially used as an aid for medical diagnoses. Mark has found that he will sometimes find "extras" in Polaroid picture taken of peoples standing in the field.

Dr. Allan Botkin’s Induced After Death Communication (IADC) presentation produced a number of points that have to be further investigated. For instance, he told the attendees that he saw evidence that too much grief could block an IADC. He also said that it seemed very much like an assistant had shared an IADC with the patient. His IADC success rate had been less for patients who knew about the process beforehand, and that he sometimes needed to "sneak up on them" to make the induction. His success rate also seemed to be much greater if he doodled while with the patient. Gary Schwartz told us that many mediums doodled, which suggests an entirely new direction for research.

Lisa began our presentation with a number of success stories that we consider to be important role models for the rest of us to follow. The EVP examples will be on the conference web site. Tom followed with the observation that it is time to standardize the way phenomena are described, and suggested "Unique Event" for experiences with none other to compare, "Indeterminate Event" for "true" phenomena that cannot be distinguished from the mundane and "Established Event" for phenomena such as EVP. He also gave an overview of the forms of visual phenomena being reported to the AA-EVP. He finished with a description of the 4Cell EVP Demonstration, explaining how effective a protocol is for EVP research.

Documentarians Tim Coleman and Dan Drasin presented drafts of two documentaries they are working on as part of a series titled, "The Survival Project." The first was dedicated to EVP, and included material showing EVP researchers, including AA-EVP members. The second focused on mediumship and the Scole Project. Scole Mediums and ITC researchers Diana and Alan Bennett were prominently featured. The drafts were very impressive. As Dan pointed out earlier, after seeing the documentary, people will be convinced that EVP is real.

Long-time EVP researcher Alexander MacRae gave the audience an overview of how he became an EVP researcher and how he has evolved his research tools. It was easy to see why his work is so often quoted by us.

Diana and Alan Bennett were instrumental in the successes of the Scole Project and have now turned their attention to visual forms of spirit communication with very impressive results, which they shared with attendees. We will try to include an article featuring the Bennett’s work in the next NewsJournal. Their technique is easily replicable in a mechanical sense, but Diana and Alan reminded the attendees how important it is for the person to make contact with the entities via meditation and respect.

Martha Copeland presented for the Big Circle and played many EVP examples. She invited Vicki Talbott and Debra Caruso to join her at the podium to describe their success with EVP. The fact that three mothers were able to tell the attendees about continuing their relationships with children now on the other side provides an important role model for all of us. About their talk, William Deluca wrote, "It gave me reassurance　that what we are doing is for real and comforts us when we really need it."

The final presentation was made by Dr. Gary Schwartz who described his early work with survival researcher, Susy Smith, and the events that led to the development of his current research protocols. Gary’s study of mediumship is producing an important, evidence-based map of what might be thought of as "organic" spirit communication, as opposed to the technology-augmented spirit communication practiced in EVP and ITC. His work has produced some of the most substantial evidence of postmortem survival of the personality available today.

Those of you who have followed Gary’s work will recognize that the 4Cell EVP Demonstration protocol has been inspired by the protocols he has developed in an effort to answer the critic’s questions.

End Note: Now that we have returned and have had an opportunity to consider what we have done, we think it is important to thank all of you who attended the conference—in person and in spirit. It was a magnificent affair! Thanks also to our friends in Spirit!                           Tom and Lisa Butler

In May, 2005, Melissa Baileys father, David "Skip" Walton, was diagnosed with stomach cancer. He was forty-nine years old. The picture of Skip at the left was taken the day he found out about the cancer. Skip is holding his finger up showing that he is number one.

Melissa wrote, "My father took it as something that was supposed to happen. He was willing to fight this sickness and be a testament to God’s healing power. You see my father grew up in the church and my grandfather was a preacher, but after some years my father had turned away from his spirituality. I had always been taught by my father that prayer was the key to all even if you’re going through the toughest things in life. Obviously the turning point for prayer in my life was finding out that my father had stomach cancer."

Skip was told that he had only six months to live and once Melissa learned about the cancer, she along with her husband, decided to move back home to help her mother and be with her father during his last days on this plane. The move back was a blessing for Melissa, as she was not only able to help with her father’s care but was able to talk to him in a way that she felt that she couldn’t do before he became sick.

A few weeks before her father’s death the family had a falling out and Melissa and her husband needed to get away. Melissa spoke with her father and asked him to do one thing if she was unable to see him again. She asked her father to visit her in her dreams and let her know that he was all right after he crossed over.

The day before Skip passed (February 23, 2006), Melissa received a phone call from her mother asking her to come home. Skip had told Coco, Melissa’s mother, that he had a dream about God and that he had been told: "Be prepared because tomorrow you are coming home." Melissa said that, no one in the family believed this. Melissa wrote, "I told my mother that I would not be coming home as of yet, that I would not want to be there seeing my father take his last breaths. I felt that something was holding me where I was and if it was my father’s time, then I would not want to be hit with the images of seeing my father dying. The day passed with my thinking of my father, whom I love so much. I received a call from the house at around 8:00 PM and was told that my father had been asking to speak with me. He told me he loves me and I told him that it’s okay for him to go. I knew my father was in pain and that he wanted my approval to move forward. My father had been told that he had only months to live and yet he held on until he knew things were all right with our family."

Melissa spoke to her mother next, and was told that everyone was there; her brothers, sisters, aunt and her mother's brother. The family was waiting for her father's brother and the pastor to come. Melissa told everyone that she loved them and then hung up the phone. It was now 9:30 PM and she was in turmoil whether she should go home or not. "My husband asked me if I wanted to leave right then but I told him that I didn’t want to leave New York yet." At 10:00 PM she told her husband that she was ready to go home. The two decided to lay down for a few hours before driving to Virginia to be with her father. She wrote, "I truly had a hard time going to sleep. I finally quieted my thoughts and prayed to God to just keep my father in his safe hands."

While dreaming, Melissa found herself in a room and felt that she was floating. People were holding hands in a half circle and one person was kneeling. "All of a sudden I knew that I was actually standing, looking at this. ... I saw a light opening up like a flower in bloom, in the corner of the room. The colors from this light were so white and bright it was beautiful to look at. I noticed that I was standing behind two people at the foot of the bed. Without looking at their faces, I know they were my father’s parents. All of a sudden I heard my grandmother say, ‘David it’s time to go,’ and then I saw the most amazing thing; I will never forget it. I saw my father rise in spirit out of his old body. He looked like his old self; healthy. He looked at himself in amazement as if astonished that he was no longer sick. He was glowing bright gold and began walking with my grandparents toward the light. He turned and said goodbye to the people praying around him. He then looked at me and said, ‘I am sorry that I will not be here with you.’ He then said, ‘Good-bye,’ smiled and continued walking toward the light. The light closed shut and I saw smoke and woke up. The pastor called within minutes, saying, ‘Your father has gone home with the Father.’ I was overwhelmed, I saw him enter the light. My father had passed and I was really there with him."

Melissa feels that God answered her prayer and allowed her to see Skip’s transition to the light. She became interested in EVP days after his crossing. She recorded with her mother, sister and niece, Kalaya. They started calling his name as David Walton, Skip and Poppy. Melissa shared the recording with us and you can hear her niece say, "Hi Poppy." Immediately you hear Skip say, "Hi Kalaya." Melissa wrote that she "can’t believe he is talking to us so soon. I feel that he is the one pulling me to try and communicate with him."

Normalyn Armour lost her firstborn son, Alan, in February in an accidental shooting. It was Normalyn who found his body. He was thirty-three at the time of the accident. He had been a second lieutenant in the Air Force Reserve and Normalyn says he was "talented, athletic, creative, and smart in everything that he did. He was a good listener, and he loved his dogs and hurt when they hurt." Alan had helped Normalyn during her father’s cancer battle and had helped cheer his brother (who is with Alan now), as he was not well himself. Alan was a pro mountain bike enthusiast, enjoyed surfing and boogie boarding, painting, drawing and was a great writer.

Normalyn wrote, "When I found him the night of his accident (yes, I know it was an accident because he was ordering another bike and had just registered for another semester), his spirit touched my face ever so gently to turn my head so that I would look down. I was about to climb a ladder to go up in the attic to look for him. He knew I was not good with heights and he kept me from climbing up.

"Then one night as I had drifted off to sleep, Alan came to me and said I would be with him soon. I felt his presence the day his headstone was placed. He really liked it. I also felt Alan with me when I drove his truck to the mountains where we used to go when he raced his mountain bike. I felt like he was sitting right next to me, almost as though he were driving the truck. I went up there on his birthday to tie a ribbon around the lift he went on and around the tree. We’ve also had a lot of phone calls with no one there."

Heidi Spencer had talked to Normalyn about Alan and EVP and conducted a recording during a Big Circle recording session. Heidi was thrilled when she heard the name, "Alan," and put it on the Idea Exchange asking if other members heard it too. One member even felt that the EVP said Alan Armour. Another EVP was captured that said, "Alan. I’m fine, tell my mom, I love her," and Normalyn recognized the voice as Alan’s.

Margaret Downey also made several recordings trying to contact Alan. She recorded, "I love her" and "I’m with Uncle Denny." Neither Margaret nor Heidi knew that there was indeed an Uncle Denny who was on the other side!

Normalyn does not have a computer set up to listen back to recordings and so Heidi Spencer not only sent her a recorder to try for EVP but offered to listen to the recordings for her. This was successful and many EVP were recorded including, "Hi Mom, Denny’s here" and I’m fine, Mom." They had been repeatedly asking Alan if he was okay.

Normalyn wrote, "All of the messages from Alan sound pretty much like him; especially the first one I received. I feel that Alan knew that his time was up. He’d talk about things at various times and especially after he said he’d seen the white light years ago when he was at officer training. He and some friends were horsing around and he got hit really hard in the chest, knocking him out. I am very grateful to Heidi and other members who have helped. I still have many hard and painful days that I go through. I deeply miss him, and there have been times when I have considered giving up. Everyone seems to have moved on in their lives but I still stay frozen in time."

Loretta Woodward shared this with us. "I went to lunch today with my childhood friends. Donna said her van was stolen a couple weeks ago. Someone apparently just drove off in it and parked it in front of someone’s house. The people in the house got tired of looking at it and called the authorities, who notified Donna.

"She went to retrieve her van but stopped to talk to the people in the house and let them know she was taking it. The woman turned out to be the mother of a student Donna had had a few years ago. This girl had leukemia and was sick and bald from undergoing treatments. She really touched Donna’s heartstrings and Donna often wondered how, and if, she was doing.

"The mother showed Donna pictures of her daughter, now with beautiful long hair. She’s attending college and doing just fine. I guess the universe really wanted Donna to have some closure on this!"

by Fred Klode

Translated by George Wynne

During my professional career, I was active as a detective and detective captain (Kriminalkommisar) in the police departments of several major German cities. In their investigations leading to indictment, our police authorities take into account only that which can be supported by irrefutable facts. They therefore ignore almost everything having to do with extrasensory or medial perceptions.

In my case, my attitude changed after the death of my wife. I started to read books written by noted mediums such as Sylvia Browne and Arthur Ford. In them I discovered a world that had heretofore been closed to me.

Motivated by the work of the pioneers in transcommunication such as Friedrich Jürgenson, Dr. Konstantin Raudive and Leo Schmid, I entered the circle of experimenters and started to attempt contacts myself. A breakthrough came one day: I recognized the authentic voice of my wife who reassured me: "Freddy, I am alive!" I blanched and cried in happiness at the same time. Today, many years later, our voice contact has developed to the point that it has become an integral part of my life.

I have never considered the results of my voice research a personal secret, but have disseminated them widely. With countless demonstration cassettes and many talks or phone calls with grieving loved ones, I have passed on the great news of the postmortem survival of personal identity. I have been able to reach some with this message, others not. But I am not afraid of derision and ridicule. I can live with it easily because experimenters who are dealing in confidence with the voice phenomenon on an almost daily basis know that a new life begins after death.

But back to the question posed in the title. From my own experience I can answer with a resolute, "Yes." Friedrich Jürgenson was the first to pose, albeit reluctantly, the question as to the identity of a murderer in the Rigmor Anderson murder case. Hans Luksch, in Austria, had a similar series of successes. And more recently his compatriot, Ernst Knirschnig, a private experimenter who lives near Vienna, succeeded in clearing up a mysterious murder case, after the local police asked him to try by means of a voice experiment. This constituted a first because the initiative actually came from the police authorities that were dealing with a case where not even the identity of the victim was known. Ernst Knirschnig succeeded splendidly in obtaining a seamless resolution of the case. The murderer was identified and convicted. (Ernst authorized this disclosure. I’ll revert to his experience further on.)

It was this convincing confirmation that motivated me to direct my attention to the issue of perpetrators of capital crimes and the discovery of missing persons. There are no book solutions or standard guides on how to proceed in this area. I follow my intuition and dismiss any possible motivation of revenge. I pose the question as to the identity of the perpetrator only after I have put myself emotionally into the victim’s shoes and sense how much the victim and his or her loved one have suffered. I also confess that I pray for all those involved irrespective of who might have been the guilty party.

In a contribution to our VDF Journal under the title Activation of ‘Hereafter’ Detectives I described two murder cases in which I received the absolutely correct identities of the perpetrators plus the exact location of one of the victim’s bodies. Police authorities were able to solve both cases without my offered assistance. However it is worth noting that in the case of the murdered girl, I received the name of the guilty party and the location of the victim’s body just four days after her disappearance. I offered these facts to the police early on in their investigation, as well as the cassette tape for their own evaluation. While it got the attention of the investigating officials, given that the offer was made by one of their colleagues, they decided to ignore it. Had they taken my information seriously, the crime would not only have been solved months earlier, but—I have to note regretfully—a second murder committed by the same criminal would have been averted.

A third case involved Nina, a young female police officer who was found dead in her locked apartment seven years ago with gunshot wounds from her service revolver. While there was much circumstantial evidence that indicated an outside perpetrator, the case was closed after being classified as a suicide triggered by depression over a disappointing love affair. The key to her locked apartment was never found and questions about it were dismissed by one of the investigators with the nonsensical comment that, "she probably swallowed the key." Unbelievable but true. A year ago, I had the opportunity to study the case file and the video of a television transmission about this puzzling case.

After discussions with a former colleague, it became extremely probable that Nina was killed by someone she knew, but no culprit could be charged though several people had been interrogated. I decided to try a recording against the background of the video cassette. I was flabbergasted by the answers that came through from the other side without myself posing a single question. The cardinal question, "Who shot Nina?" was answered unequivocally. Her friend and colleague who had been a suspect was described as innocent. What followed then surprised me no end. The name of the murderer was shouted by several voices. I asked myself, "Didn’t I read that name in the files days ago?" I went through the files and sure enough I saw the name of the neighbor. He had been interviewed by the police investigators at the time, but that was all. What to do now? Offer the tape to her parents, the police? It reposes in my desk drawer because of reluctance to reopen the case.

An automatic writing medium of my acquaintance, and I, received nearly identical information as to the fate of a ten year old Turkish boy who disappeared some time ago. A truck driver had picked up the boy, took him to the Netherlands and introduced him to drugs. Reportedly he is alive, the police received the information, and a further reading produced the correct phone number of the missing boy’s family. A second missing persons case also was solved relatively quickly. Police had searched three months for a missing soldier in Bavaria. It turned out that the twenty year old had drowned in a reservoir that had been described precisely by the medium.

Everyone who has experimented with voice phenomena knows that these fibbing and lying voices exist. These reach from known lies to the worst sort of rude comments. No one is safe from them. Once I got a voice that stated: "Not everyone is lying here," which seems to offer some hope, but on the other hand, implies that lies are tolerated. Are lies just as frequent as true statements, or expressed differently: How can I determine what is true? I revert to Ernst Knirschnig in Austria. He was fooled many times with phony names and addresses. When he asked, "Why," he was given the message: "Go to church and pray." He did as he was told, and from then, only true statements surfaced in his sessions. I have determined that significant statements are preceded by such exclamations as, "Attention!" and "Now!" This is what happened when the location of the body of the murdered girl came through and when the perpetrator was named.

If you agree with the hypothesis that the deceased keep their own character in the next world and do not instantly turn into better people, we should not be surprised that we may be deceived. In my view the love of truth progresses in tandem with the individual’s progress on the other side. We just don’t know whom we are dealing with and at what level the entity resides. Once, when I asked Dr. Raudive whether I could disseminate the results of our session, I received the answer: "Permission will be given later." We need to understand that decisions in the Beyond are taken by higher powers and not by new arrivals who have not yet established themselves in their new surroundings

As experimenters we are not in competition with the prosecuting authorities. It is their primary duty to solve crimes and to find missing persons. Initially, if a case becomes more complicated than is supposed, the police hypothesize possible motives and sequences of events. We should offer our cooperation only when the public is asked to help. From my own experience I know that extrasensory indications need to be considered worthy of evaluation and review, that they do not belong in a waste basket, even if they are regarded skeptically. I dare say that our police authorities will achieve new ways of thinking. The media too, regard us critically. They consider voice phenomena as a challenge to common sense, which is why we rarely find factual reports. The tabloids even stoop to slander, knowing that the bulk of their readers are not interested in serious discussion. Sad but true.

We have had a dialogue within our VTF egroup with a lively exchange on why one member obtains demonstrable results and another does not. A view has even been presented that information about perpetrators will only be accurate if not disclosed to the police. We often regret that pertinent questions either are not responded to at all or that answers cannot be understood properly. As I said there are no standard instructions, every experimenter is on his own when it comes to these phenomena. I found out that accurate statements may be embedded in what seem at the time like nonsensical comments that are easily dismissed. Patience and perseverance on the part of the experimenter in my view are the only qualities that count. Some of us are closer to the truth than we think possible. It’s like a mosaic in which many pieces must be assembled into a whole.

Other than supporting the membership, our job as directors of the AA-EVP is to find ways to tell the public about the fact of EVP and related phenomena. The aaevp.com web site does a good job of this, and we see more than a thousand unique visitors to the site every day. Thousands of copies of the book we wrote, There is No Death and There are No Dead, have been sold, and of course, thousands of people around the world have seen the bonus features about EVP in the White Noise DVD. Probably the most important way for the word to get out about EVP is via word of mouth, and we know that you, the members, are always ready with an explanation for interested friends and the media.

Ah yes, the media. At the time of this writing, we are anticipating four camera crews to be at the June conference in Atlanta. However, the point of this article is a recent experience we had with a production team trying to sell a new television series titled, Prove It. They asked us to represent EVP as the subject of a one-hour pilot which they would use to sell the concept. The format included a master of ceremonies, two celebrity judges and an audience which acted as the third judge. EVP is almost always shown in the context of ghosts and haunted buildings, so we were excited about the format for Prove It. Except for one problem, the MC and the judges were all comedians, and part of the deal was that they had a lot of fun with the subject. Oh well.

We think that we did a good job presenting EVP in the more or less thirty minutes we had (minus the time we had to wait for the jokes). The jokes were not aimed at us, just the usual "oh that’s spooky" sort of jokes. We are pretty serious about these things and it was our hope that a little humor might make our rather serious message more easily considered by the audience. In the end, we convinced one judge and about a third of the audience, so the verdict was that we did not "prove it."

See Siyoh Tomiyama’s article, "How should we start to explain the afterlife?" He makes the point that it is important to approach a person at the level of acceptability the person is able to manage, rather than trying to convince them of something that is way past their "boggle point." Well, we were trying to prove that EVP is proof that we survive physical death. The fact of personal survival is beyond just about everyone’s boggle point and we should have known better than to even try.

If the series is sold, and if we are asked back for the real thing, a condition of our agreement to participate will be that we will attempt to prove that EVP cannot be explained with known physical principles without even discussing the implications. There is very good evidence, both experimentally established using sound scientific protocol, and anecdotal, provided by the hundreds of people around the world who are routinely using EVP to communicate with their loved ones. The evidence we might cite includes:

That is the main evidence that EVP exists and cannot be explained in terms of physical science.

by Siyoh Tomiyama

T

his article might help you if you want to spread your knowledge about the afterlife to the public.

Everybody has a personal limit point in their beliefs. Let’s call this point "LPB." People try with all their might to find the reason to deny a phenomenon which is beyond their LPB. If a phenomenon is around their LPB, they might try to find more facts which support the legitimacy of the phenomenon. People would believe a phenomenon if it is below their LPB, or they might try to experience it by themselves to check its legitimacy. Yes, people check the legitimacy of the phenomenon only if it is below or around their LPB. No one will think about phenomena beyond their LPB no matter that there are many proofs which support them. That is the problem.

I believe the readers of this NewsJournal have a higher level of LPB than average people. But maybe, it will be hard for some of you to believe the existence of persons who can fly. I personally know three persons who claim they can fly, or more precisely, hover. One of them is a good psychic and a close friend of mine.

She thought she might be able to fly when she was a child. However it was scary even for her at that age to fly from the top of a cliff. So she started to jump from a tree at first. First from only one meter high. She didn’t fall down. Instead she very slowly landed like she didn’t have any weight. She gradually jumped from higher and higher places. And finally she jumped from a cliff landing on the ground as if she wore a parachute.

Do you believe this story? I believe her since she has been my good friend for six years and I know two more trustworthy persons who also claim they have flown. Still I don’t usually tell this kind of story to many people so that people don’t think I am spooky. Some readers might count me spooky at this point. If you think so, that means your LPB is lower, or in other words, you are still a slave of common sense.

The necessary level of LPB to accept EVP is definitely lower than the one required for accepting a human flying. However an educated, good citizen seems to have quite low LPB. I feel even EVP is not a good starting point for the majority of people in the world. We have to raise their LPB before we talk about EVP to them. So, how can we do this?

We should start from a comfortable point for the public. My psychic friend gradually raised the height of the jumping place. It was not a practice for the physical body, rather for her mind. She finally jumped from a cliff. Those trials made her LPB higher. This is why she could actually jump from a cliff. But later, her LPB for the flying became lower again since she got to know the facts people basically cannot fly. It is difficult to control one’s LPB level because it is generally controlled by the subconscious.

The fact is, we can gradually raise the LPB of others by presenting firm proofs although it can easily go down again. And the more important fact is, people never trust us if we choose a wrong starting point which is already beyond their LPB. Plenty of firm proofs play no roll in this case. Any story related with the afterlife is beyond one’s LPB for many people. So EVP is definitely not a good starting point for them. We have to choose a different start point if we want to introduce EVP to those who have a lower LPB.

While the afterlife story is ridiculous for them, a super power of a living human’s mind seems more acceptable. A spoon-bending might be one possible starting point. You had better have had an experience in bending a spoon if you want to start with this. According to a physicist who I believe resolved some secret of the world, there are two types of human super mind power. To talk with the dead and healing are in the same category while the bending of a spoon is in the other category. So it’s possible you can bend a spoon by yourself even if you have never recorded an EVP message.

As for me, I use a compound starting point. The better I play the guitar, the easier I can tell the possibility of our minds. After an almost fifteen-year break, forced by a finger problem, I restarted the guitar practice four-and-a-half years ago, at the age of forty. It was three months after resuming the guitar that I bent a spoon for the first time in my life. Then I thought I would be able to fix my finger problem, since I could manage to deliver my thought to metal. Another changing point happened four months after this. One of the Monroe Institute’s Hemi-Sync series, "Synchronizing," made my fingers move faster than ever. So, I can say it is proof that the mind helps me play the guitar better. I registered for two important guitar competitions in Japan this year. And I remained to the final stage of both competitions among twenties and teens although I won no prize. Now it seems I have become a star of middle and senior age in the classical guitar field. I had a full-scale concert at a friend’s home in January after an interval of twenty-one years. I talked about the possibilities of our mind during each piece at the concert. Playing the guitar, this is my starting point in explaining the afterlife.

Please always consider how you start to tell your story. The starting point is most important.

All photographs taken by Jim Stonier unless otherwise noted.

As I approached my 65th birthday and retirement from the work force last year, I was often asked by business associates and friends what I plan to do with all my free time. I’d tell them I intend to "practice death."

I knew my response would draw puzzled expressions and raised eyebrows, but I would throw it out anyway in the hope that the person would ask for clarification. I enjoy talking about death almost as much as I do reading and writing about it.

Before you decide I need psychiatric help, let me call on several esteemed people to support my position.

The eminent Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Jung, said that it is psychologically beneficial to have death as a goal toward which to strive. Mozart called death the key to unlocking the door to true happiness. Shakespeare wrote that when we are prepared for death, life is sweeter. The French philosopher Michel de Montaigne said that "to practice death is to practice freedom."

Strange ideas to most, but these great men drank deep from the fountain of wisdom and understood life’s greatest paradox—that in embracing death we can live a fuller, more enjoyable, more meaningful life.

"Death is indeed a fearful piece of brutality," Jung offered. "There is no sense in pretending otherwise. It is brutal, not only as a physical event but far more so psychically. However, from another point of view, death appears a joyful event. In the light of eternity, it is a wedding, a mysterium conjunctionis. The soul attains, as it were, its missing half. It achieves wholeness."

It’s difficult for most Western materialists, whether they subscribe to a religion or not, to comprehend such sage reasoning. "The idea of death, the fear of it, haunts the human mind like nothing else," wrote anthropologist Ernest Becker in his 1974 Pulitzer prize-winning book, The Denial of Death. Becker explained that to free oneself of death anxiety, nearly everyone chooses the path of repression. We bury the idea of death deep in the subconscious and then busy ourselves with our jobs, partake of pleasures, strut in our new clothes, show off our polished cars, hit little white balls into round holes, escape into fictitious stories in books, at the movies and on television, experience vicarious thrills at sporting events, pursue material wealth, and seek a mundane security that we expect to continue indefinitely—all the while oblivious to the fact that in the great scheme of things such activities are exceedingly short-term, and for the most part, meaningless. Becker refers to this "secure" person as the "automatic cultural man." He is "man confined by culture, a slave to it, who imagines that he has an identity if he pays his insurance premiums, that he has control of his life if he guns his sports car or works his electric toothbrush."

Becker’s automatic cultural man is a modern description of Kierkegaard’s "Philistine." For Kierkegaard, Philistinism was man fully concerned with the trivial. Of course, if we are not completely selfish, we also involve ourselves in loving, caring for and serving others. Those acts seem to at least partially give meaning to our lives and validate our existence, until we ask: If our loved ones are simply marching toward nothingness with us, what’s the point of it all?

Eventually, one day, perhaps when it becomes apparent that our days are numbered, those repressed anxieties relating to death begin welling up into the consciousness. We proceed to live our final years under a dark and increasingly foreboding shadow. For the most part, the muddled information provided by orthodox religion offers little relief, little comfort.

Becker called repression of death the enemy of mankind. Conversely, the unrepressed life can bring into birth a new way of being. Robert Jay Lifton, a distinguished professor of psychiatry and psychology, makes the same point, stating that we must "know death" in order to live with free imagination.

As I understand it, knowing death is what Montaigne called practicing death, a term which seems to have originated with Socrates. As he put it, according to Plato, practicing death is merely pursuing philosophy "in the right way" and learning how "to face death easily." It can also be referred to as embracing death.

As I see it, the key to living the unrepressed life is having a sense of immortality, a firm belief that our earthly life is part of a much larger and eternal life. Lifton points out that there are some who can derive satisfaction out of a biological sense of immortality, that there will be a "living on" through one’s progeny. There is also the creative mode, whereby one "lives on" through his or her works of art, literature, or science. However, when we begin to ask ourselves to which generation full fruition, to what end the legacy, such views seem pretty foolish and myopic.

I think the bottom line is that we must accept the survival of consciousness at death in order to free ourselves from the fetters that bind us to our culture’s negative view of death. Unfortunately, orthodox religion, especially the Judeo-Christian form, has done little to help us understand the survival of consciousness. It tells us that faith alone is all that is necessary. Yet, all the practicing Jews and Christians that I know—and I know quite a few—seem to fit into Becker’s "automatic cultural man" mold, escaping from death anxiety through the use of repression. Most of them strive to be one with their toys, rather than ONE with the Creator. Death is a monster to be feared.

To me, practicing death means moving from either skepticism or blind faith to conviction by continually searching for higher truths, cultivating an awareness of the larger life, and then being able to visualize other realms of existence. This is done through constant metaphysical study, through testing, analyzing, and discerning both ancient and modern revelation, through meditating, praying, and pondering, through seeking, serving, striving, struggling, surrendering, sacrificing, and finally, solving and soaring.

In practicing death, one does not live in the past or the future, not even in the present. One lives in eternity, which is the only true way to live in the present as well as to live in the past, present, and future at the same time.

Practicing death does not mean locking oneself up and hiding from the rest of the world while pursuing enlightenment. It simply means putting priority on searching for Truth so that we can better love and serve our fellow humans in what time we have left. That search might not take any more than an hour a day, the time many of us spend on physical exercise to assure a particular quality of life. However, that hour a day should gradually allow us to better understand life, to savor it, to harmonize with it, to find inner peace, tranquility and repose, to move closer to being one with the Creator and to make a graceful transition to the world of higher vibration when the time is right.

The alternative to practicing death, as I see it, is living out one’s final years by doing not much more than growing gray, griping, groaning, groping, growling, grabbing and grieving—the path followed by Becker’s automatic cultural man.

"Let us have nothing more in mind than death," said Montaigne. "At every instant, let us evoke it in our imagination under all aspects. Let us wait for it everywhere."

A recent email from a web site visitor has brought up some interesting possibilities for visual ITC.

Hello. Recently, while playing with a program on myheritage.com, I was having photos of family members scanned to see their facial resemblances against celebrities. The program rates the percentage of the resemblance. In one photo the program picked up a face at the bottom of a glass that the person was holding in the photo, and indicated that the resemblance was 70%. With the naked eye or just off my computer screen it is difficult to see anything in the photo by simply enlarging it. I did take a PrintScreen of what the program showed me and where it pointed to in the picture. Thanks again, Cynthia Falco

The web site is at http://www.myheritage.com/

It is usual to think of a hauntings situation as a case of discarnate entities causing physical effects, such as unexpected sounds, movement of objects and the occasional apparition. Our working theory is that places are able to be haunted because of the available energy. You might call it the energy of life or auric energy which reportedly accumulates during long-time human occupancy or the expression of strong emotions. Geology may have something to do with hauntings, as well, but we think that this factor requires a little more research before it is too seriously considered.

The assumption is that the hauntings are caused by dead people acting up, but what if there are parallel physical worlds? While we say that "dead" people live in the etheric, people living in other aspects of physical reality are in physical bodies. Some people interpret some phenomena as evidence of alternate physical realities. For instance, hearing unseen people engaged in personal conversation as they walk past you but many feet above your head, cannot be easily explained in terms of trans-etheric phenomena.

What would cause an alternative reality? Perhaps a major decision in our time stream is made differently, such as opting for peace rather than going for war, causing a fork in the time stream and two resulting worlds changing under the influence of the different decisions. What would it be like if there was a "rip" in the fabric of physical reality, allowing one time stream to impinge on the other? Perhaps such a rip might form if the different decisions eventually produced very similar results. Of course, this is all speculation, but what if? Such a rip in physical reality would likely allow people of one time stream to become aware of the other. Perhaps people might even be able to travel between time streams.

No, we are not thinking about writing a science fiction story. We have received reports of phenomena that do not resemble the usual set of hauntings experiences we expect to see; however, what the person has experienced might be better explained by the presence of a portal between this physical reality and something else that is not necessarily nonphysical. The report came to us as a new example of a face on a turned off television screen. Unlike the usual example in which there is a child in the scene, and the face is peering into the room, this one seems to be a portrait of a military man formed in the optical noise of the screen surface. We refer to this type of Visual ITC as "Reflective Light ITC" and there are examples on the web site. As it turns out, the optical characteristics of turned off television screens are very good for Reflective Light ITC.

We will refer to the experiencer as "Mr. D" to respect his privacy. The first picture is a cropped version of what he sent us, just showing the TV screen. Mr. D was taking a picture of his pet, and the rather large screen was incidental to the picture. As you can see, the feature is formed in the noise from the flash. The second picture is the same, but we have traced important features and did a little "enhancing" in an attempt to make the feature more easily distinguished. Those of you receiving this via an online PDF file will see the color version with a clear hint of a red uniform.

As we see the picture, it is of a man sitting on an easy chair or couch with his left hand on the left armrest. Based on his posture, his left leg would be turned nearly against the chair, knee nearly under the arm rest. He is wearing an unbuttoned dark red jacket that has piping around the buttons and collar. The jacket has a high, stiff collar that is close to the throat. He apparently has short dark hair and is facing to his left side, face slightly lifted as if appealing to God. His left hand either has six fingers that are more serpentine than bony or he has a very large ring on his index finger. He is either holding something like the neck of a guitar in his right hand and close to his chest, or his right hand is there and it has six fingers; however, if fingers, they appear to be bony.

The information about the person is really limited so we are guessing a lot. The point is that the feature should not be there, and it is a seemingly heroic figure that is either historic or outside of our line of evolution. He appears as Visual ITC, but we are not sure how it would be communication. That is a usual problem with Visual ITC.

Mr. D reports that there was a period of time in which he experienced quite a lot of activity, including orbs that would seem to come out of a wall, move about, even stand still at times and then pass out of sight through a wall again. He sent us a couple of videotaped examples, including one that shows his dog leaving the scene by leaping from the couch just before an orb swoops down, apparently intent on harassing the dog. The dog obviously sensed the orb and left the scene in advance.

Mr. D told us that, "This video happened within a few feet of the TV, and in it, the orbs are moving very fast, but I did see them prior to the video. The third orb in the video was the one that flew up to me and stopped when I was at my PC and did the circles I described (yes you can tell them apart). The other two always seemed to be together every time I had seen them….

"The orbs I have seen all have common traits. When not moving they look like plasma I guess, they have a definite shape and the inside of the orb has swirling white that looks electrical. They also have a tail of sorts. Some people call it a contrail but it is not, because the "tail" is there when the orb is stationary, it kind of swishes back and forth, and just before an orb takes off at high speed, this tail vibrates back and forth rapidly. You will not see that in the clip because they are moving so fast, but I have a still of a stationary one that is exactly what they look like at rest (Shown here. We believe the mottled effect of the orb in the picture is an artifact). Again, these can be seen with your eyes, unaided by any nightshot, strobes, infrared, etc."

Mr. D also reported computer text files that have appeared with long strings of characters. "One night very late I was at the PC and a cane came flying into the room I was in (the room with my desk and PC). The cane had been hanging on a door to the basement across the hallway. At the same time that happened, I heard the basement door try to open but snap shut with a loud bang due to a hook and loop latch on the door. I got up from the desk, went to the basement door and saw a bright light radiating through all sides of the door. It was much brighter than the 60 watt light above the basement stairway.

"I went into my bedroom, grabbed a phone and a firearm and went back to the basement door, but by then, there was no light whatsoever coming from around the door. Accordingly, coward that I am, I left the house and called the police from the street. Three patrol cars came, the police searched the basement and found nothing down there at all, nor were there any windows broken or opened. Naturally that gave rise to the question as to what was trying to open the door and what caused the bright light.

"In any event, I found the message below on my PC monitor the next evening. As you may know, unless a dictation program is trained to a particular voice many errors occur, for instance, "rye" could be "bye" or "row" perhaps "throw." However, I found enough cogent parts to reasonably believe there may be a message there pertaining to the prior night, including a mention of the 911 emergency police number (that was seven days before the 9/11 attack)."

The programs that started unattended were Microsoft Word (into which the text would appear) and MS Voice Dictation (to establish a connection with the microphone). Here is a portion of the text: "room had run and were run and ran in Rye Rye and I know it ran in ran out of room and were wrong to room right right room where it right said it Rye from ran out room was to Rye Rye will you were right thing and wrong for room and Rye were Rye and were to the room and were running Rye room I room in room … what what are all what room what it and a room written a room in a room room and room wrong and 911 room room and 911 room and were room were winging …"

Mr. D’s unusual activity has subsided except for the occasional event seemingly designed to let him know that there is still contact. A ghost hunting group has investigated Mr. D’s home, and via our communication with him, we are convinced that he has the experiences he reports. The orb video and picture are convincing, and the face on the TV screen is extraordinary but of a form which we have seen from other people. Where he lives is not very old and he could find no reports of events that would produce a local ghost or emotional energy. Because of the nature of the events he has reported, we feel that any future investigation should consider the possibility that the events represent trans-time/reality influences, as well as the possibility that they are trans-etheric.

Whatever the cause, we will be looking for other reports from other people that might help us understand what seems to be a very different class of phenomena. Our thanks go to Mr. D for allowing us to publish this material.

Cell Name: CellOctetic

Cell Name: CellOctetic

Vicki added, "I think that he and his friends on the other side did not want to hurt their moms or frighten others—they discussed whether Braden could even say it. He knew I could handle it, but others might not be able to. The EVP came as you see it above. As I said, Braden wants us to know that this is an important part of our passing, our life review."

Comment: Near Death Experience researchers appear to be in agreement that we do experience a life review, and that it is from the perspective of those with whom we have interacted during the lifetime. This review can be expected to be emotionally painful, and is probably the foundation on which we build new spiritual understanding. The 4Cell results are amongst the very few we have seen indicating all is not fun and games when we make our transition.

Cell Name: Cease2dcease

Using EVP to find missing people has proven to be frustrating because it is necessary to have a lot of confidence in the information before going to the family or authorities. The family of a missing person came to us for help, and Debra Caruso, Chris Kennedy and Margaret Downey have been attempting to help while following a specific protocol spelled out on the Idea Exchange. Because the three had no way to certify their results, they have decided to adopt the 4Cell protocol to a three person protocol, replacing the questioner with the answer to the previous experiment’s question. We hope to report their results in the next NewsJournal.

Beatrice Hofman was excited about the Luminator picture that was taken of her during the conference. She is certain that the picture also contains the face of her daughter Lauren who crossed to the other side on June 24, 2002, at the age of 20.

We do not often publish "attaboy" letters, but Richard Darby offered a critique that we feel reflects the attitude of many who are drawn to the AA-EVP. Richard wrote in the Idea Exchange, "Tom, Shell (Morrison), and Margaret (Downey),

"… I’m interested in EVP/ITC because I want to learn, not teach, but I did want to thank you for your thoughtful replies, and, above all, your open-mindedness.

"Tom, one reason I was drawn to the AA-EVP was your experimental attitude and freedom from dogma. I’ve done a fair amount of reading in the fields of psychical research and metaphysical/spiritual issues, and do not always find this degree of scientific spirit. A lot of guides to the other realms just "know."

"Well, maybe some mediums really do know all about spirits and the afterlife.... I certainly don’t rule out mediumship as one possible methodology, and am fascinated by accounts of sittings. But the scientific approach using modern technology is also important for non-psychics like me.

"It looks like the AA-EVP is fulfilling the original mission of the Society for Psychical Research as conceived by its founders in 1882, to use science to investigate the paranormal, including survival (a subject which the SPR no longer seems to take seriously except among a few old hands, especially now that Monty Keen has passed over).

"It’s hard to strike a balance between openness to evidence and a reasonable skepticism that isn’t too credulous and that doesn’t draw firm conclusions while the picture isn’t fully clear. But to make real progress, it’s worth the effort."

Thanks, Richard. The point that I think keeps us honest is the realization that no one of us is going to turn EVP/ITC into a robust technology available to everyone. It is going to take many of us operating as a cooperating, collaborating team to be successful. We hope that the AA-EVP can play a part in that future, and we know that the members are the AA-EVP.

Siobhan McBride wrote this note to us and we passed it along to Dr. Allan Botkin. "In the mid 90s, I trained in a process called Rapid Eye Therapy. It is very similar to EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing). Rapid Eye was started by Renae Johnson, where EMDR originated from Francine Shapiro.

"During my training sessions, we were required to work on each other. In one of my sessions when I was ‘the patient,’ my grandfather appeared to me with a message for my second oldest son. (They both had a problem with alcohol abuse). He seemed to be happy and was smiling during the encounter. It was a curiosity to me, since I had never met my grandfather in this life and in all the photos I had seen of him, he had a very stern look on his face.

"When I heard Allan Botkin speak of this amazing technique he’d come up with on Coast to Coast, I realized immediately that I had experienced that and that it truly works!!"

Allan wrote back, "That certainly sounds like an ADC to me. The deceased smile way more than we do!"