The Jesus Question

A topic came up in a forum the other day, a person asked "What about the historical accounts of Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha and other avatars being "sent" to the planet for our own good? And further, asked if there was "any historical evidence that these people actually existed?"

I'm not a scholar.  But I play one on TV.  Just kidding. I've read and corresponded with a few biblical scholars, including Ian Wilson, who's written extensively about the Shroud of Turin.

So far, a number of between life hypnosis sessions, people claim to have known him,
seen him, or heard him speak in public.  All of their accounts generally describe the same person
(even though that may be influenced by paintings) but all have described the same
intense reaction to being near him - something akin to "being mesmerized" "transfixed"
"losing their breath" and in more than one case, tears and red cheeks the closer he appeared.

But on a general note, I included a chapter in "It's a Wonderful Afterlife" Volume 2, where a medium claims to be speaking to Jesus during a session.  And some things were said in that session that corroborated my own research into the arena... but here are my notes about her post:

Actually, Jesus is mentioned in the Qu'ran more than Mohammed. (excellent translation here from USC -) Identified as Isa, in that book, there's a claim that he survived the Crucifixion and traveled to India. In Asia he's known as Isa, or Issa. There's quite a bit of evidence of his travels there, if you care to examine it, from the years from 12-29, roughly, traveling along the silk route and teaching, learning from others along the way.

There's a book written about his journeys that was translated by a Sherpa, who translated it to Russian for the explorer Notovitch, who translated it to French when it was published. Later in the 1960's, another Indian pandit  (Swami Abhedananda) read the same original book at Hemis, and concurred that Notovitch's translation was correct. (I mention this as Notovitch was assailed after the publication, but I like to point out he didn't translate it - his guide did).

(well made doc about the reports of his having been in India prior to his trip to Jerusalem)

I've read the book, been to Hemis, seen the BBC dox on the topic (available on youtube) and a friend made a film "Jesus in India" that explores the evidence of these stories. There's a website, "tombofjesus" that offers written accounts from other languages of his travels in Persia, India, etc. in their "documents" section. Even Josephus, the Roman historian mentions Jesus. 

When it comes to stories about Krishna, Brahma, even Buddha, they're a bit like the greek myths - there may or may not have been these people who existed and were written about, Herakles, Hercules, etc, and their stories have grown over time.

However, if you ever get a chance to visit the "relics of Buddha" tour, you can examine for yourself the hair, blood and written scraps and other pieces of famous Buddhist icons, including his own relics that have been preserved for 2500 years. But in Jesus' case - yes, there's quite a bit of evidence of his existence. What's happened however, is like the Greek stories, and the Indian stories, that his path and journey was edited/changed/developed by those who had a vested interest in how they'd like events to happen. 

Like editing out women from the apostles, or even editing the four gospels so they all end on the same sentence. Unlikely to happen when they're written so far apart by various people - and the Hemis book follows the story as told by Jewish merchants, who had one key detail different than the Roman version - their book claims that when Pilate asked Jesus about his comments about "render unto Caesar" that Jesus said in effect, "why are you wasting our time with these questions when you have the power of life or death over me?" at which point, Pilate orders his immediate execution. (with no side trip to Herod).

IT'S FREE HERE, VIA THE GUTENBERG PROJECT. TRANSLATED FROM TIBETAN TO RUSSIAN, THEN TO FRENCH, THEN TO ENGLISH. TEXT CORROBORATED BY OTHERS WHO HAVE SEEN IT. A COPY REPORTEDLY RESIDES IN LHASA.

In this account, the Sanhedrin, Jewish leaders protest vehemently, as Roman law precluded killing "holy men" of the Jewish faith, and argue that Jesus is "of the book" and not subject to Roman law. To which Pilate throws them out. They are the ones who did the Jewish ritual of "washing their hands" of his death, as a Roman prelate was also the head of the religion, and would never have performed a sacred ritual of their religion in public - it would have been heretical. 

So the Roman editions of the Bible include the Sanhedrin being blamed for Jesus' death, and the Roman prelate "washing his hands" of the event. A convenient narrative that appears to have been added when Rome became Christian, and the Gospels were gathered and edited in the council of Nicea.

The Tibetan narrative ends with his "death on the cross" but other narratives pick up from there - when a fellow named Yuz Asaf (the anointed one) travels back to India in 33 AD, with his wife or mother Miriam (of virgin birth). There's a monument to Yuz Asaf in Persia, quoting him as saying "I am the light and the way." That fellow moves to Kashmir, where he's buried, and there's a plaster cast of his feet next to his tomb. Whoever this fellow was, clearly had survived a Crucifixion.

I was interviewing a medium the other day, who appeared to access Jesus during her session - (and I include a transcript from another session with Jesus and a medium in "It's A Wonderful Afterlife" volume two) and in this case, the medium claimed that Jesus showed her a quick series of images in succession - Krishna, Buddha, Brahma, etc - and the medium asked "These are all you?" And then after a pause said "No, he's showing me that all of these people were avatars, and that they're energetic makeup is closer to source, that's why when they're on the planet they have a stronger ability to be connected to the spirit world."

She also claimed that Jesus said he survived the Crucifixion, ("with the help of both Romans and his followers") and that he came here to let people know how close we are to the afterlife, that it's not far away, and that we are all equal over there, and should treat each other the same over here. I thought that was pretty interesting. In essence, what I've learned is that religion is humanity's way to explain, reconnect us to the spirit world, where we are forgiving, filled with love and see each other equally. And this examination of people under hypnosis - from a purely scientific point of view - is a way of proving to people that is the case.

And finally, and this kind of blows my mind, I got an email from someone the other day including their LBL where they described in detail "the plot" of how they pulled off the most famous trick in history - that of making it appear that Jesus was dead (Using the teachings of an old wise man "from the Orient" who showed us how to "stop all breathing." - the same thing was said in the account in "It's a Wonderful Afterlife" that he had been taught "yoga techniques from a Tibetan monk"). And this transcript includes what and how he was able to leave Jerusalem, "changed his name" but was traveling with his "wife Miriam." 

This person read the account in my book, was startled at how in line it was with her own LBL, where she was a man in Jerusalem, and a friend close enough to Jesus to know the story behind the story of how they helped him escape. (Mind blown!)

I come from a long line of Catholics, both Irish and Italian.
My grandfather was baptized her in this 5th century chapel in the Alps.

Is Jesus mentioned more often than Mohammed in the Qu'ran? Yes. Does the Qu'ran claim that Jesus survived the Crucifixion and went to teach in India? Yes. Does the Gospel of Thomas claim that Jesus sent Thomas to India, and then later he saw Jesus teaching there? Yes. Are there monuments to Isa in Asia that seem crafted by the same guy in the Bible? Yes. Is there a statue to Yuz Asaf in Persia? Yes. These aren't debatable facts. 

As I mention in "Flipside" when interviewing former President of the Newton Institute Paul Aurand, I asked if there were any "recurring themes" in his clients. And he said he'd had numerous clients who remember lifetimes during the life of Jesus and how much his death (or disappearance) affected them. And then I filmed a woman (in Flipside the chapter "He Turned Sunset into Sunrise") who recounted the same story of knowing him, and his affect on her. I've known this woman for years, and was as startled as she was to learn this detail.

Then I found Dr. Brian Weiss' own experience of remembering a lifetime when he met and dined with Jesus, and then how when he was working on a client under hypnosis the client suddenly announced that "you were there too, Dr. Weiss. On the Via Dolorosa." And Weiss had never told anyone that he remembered being there when Jesus supposedly carried the cross for his own Crucifixion and this man described accurately the color of robe he was wearing (with "orange piping." a small detail, but a detail).

 I know at least one Harvard PhD who's working on a book about mediums and their experiences being "contacted by" or working with Jesus. And he's doing so under controlled experiments at his lab as we speak. So we'll see what science has to say about the existence of this "fellow from the Flipside."

So - that Jesus dude gets around. 

Whether he's a figment of our imagination, a figment of the collective unconscious, or actually a dude still helping those who cross over and he tells them to come back (as happens often in NDEs) - that remains to be seen. 

An awful lot of people from all walks of life claim to have seen him during their near death experience - but always as the fellow who says "It's not your time yet."  

He's not reported showing up in people of other faith's NDE's, they appear to have their own avatars who show up to send them back to the planet. 

But the bottom line is, research into these accounts hasn't even begun. And that's why I'm  here discussing it. It should begin.

Interview on Z Talk Radio talking "Flipside"

#36- Rich Martini-FlipSide: Afterlife  Here's last night's interview. Enjoy. #36- Rich Martini-FlipSide: Afterlife

or here:

Appearing tonight on Z Talk Radio talking "Flipside"

#36- Rich Martin-FlipSide: Afterlife  Here's last night's interview. Enjoy. #36- Rich Martin-FlipSide: Afterlife

Allen Warren has me on his Z talk radio show tonight on Warrenxchangeradio at www.ztalkradio.com

Funny thing, we spoke for 3 hours a few weeks ago, and then he emailed me to tell me that somehow the show had disappeared.

"Oh well," I said, "someone on the "Flipside" probably didn't like it."

I was joking, of course.  Like they've got so little to do on the "Flipside" that they'll take the time to hover around and listen to me on the radio.

Be that as it may, he found it - somewhere - and now it lives again.  So tonight at 6 pm Pacific Time, it will be on Z talk radio.  Not sure how long it's going to be, and I'd tune in to listen to myself talk, but then I can do that any old time.

Here's from his Facebook page with links:

It's Finally Here! Our Show with Guest Rich Martini! Author and award winning filmmaker Richard Martini has written and/or directed 9 indie films. A former free lance journalist for Variety, Inc.Com, Premiere and other magazines, a graduate of the Masters of Professional Writing Program at USC, FlipSide: A Tourist's Guide to the Afterlife is his debut non-fiction book on a topic that's been haunting him since the death of a soul mate.
Tonight at 6 pM Pacific/9 PM Eastern Only on ztalkradio.com !!!


So tune in if you'd like to hear the latest from the "Flipside." (Or just go to Z Talk Radio and look for Alan Warren's Show)

Wanda Syke's Ghost and Dolphin Consciousness

Here's a fun "person no longer on the planet" story. 

Wanda Sykes Sees Ghost   from The Blaze.com

Comedian Wanda Sykes appeared on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” on Wednesday, where she revealed an apparent encounter that she claims to have had with a ghost while staying at a historic hotel in Virginia.

“I don’t want people to think I’m crazy, but it happened,” she told host Ellen DeGeneres.

Sykes said that she returned to her room at the Jefferson Hotel in Richmond, Virginia, after a show one night, and suddenly felt that something wasn’t quite right.

“I just had a sense that somebody else is in this room and I was like looking around,” she said, admitting that she had a few drinks. “I just had to make sure that it wasn’t the alcohol, but I was like, ‘No, something is in the room,’ and I kind of looked out of the corner of my eye and it was this woman — it was an old black woman, right, and she just was looking at me.”

Sykes added, “I’m pretty sure she was a slave, because don’t nobody wear stuff like that anymore.”

Wanda Sykes attends the 2015 NBCUniversal Summer Press Day at the Langham Hotel on April 2, 2015 in Pasadena, California. (Jason Kempin/Getty Images)

The comedian said she didn’t feel like the ghost would hurt her, and said that it seemed as though she was more surprised than anything else to see Sykes inside of such a nice hotel room.

The comedian joked that she told the ghost that “things turned out pretty good,” with DeGeneres and the audience erupting in laughter.

“And I know you’re really probably just blown away to see me — this black woman — in this big hotel room,” Sykes apparently told the ghost, going on to quip about what she did next. ”I got the remote control. ‘If this is good, wait until you see who the president is. This is going to scare the hell out of you.’”

She said the woman stayed and watched her for a little while before disappearing.

“And I said, ‘Why don’t you go scare white people. That’s what I would do if I were you,’” Sykes joked.

Wanda saw a Civil War era ghost in a hotel room.  She said the woman was "dressed like a slave."  So that means she saw her clearly enough, long enough to form an opinion about how she was dressed.  She said the ghost didn't seem upset, or emotional, but had a look on her face as if to say "well, look at you."  Wanda then riffs into a hilarious take on that - thanking the ghost for suffering as a slave, and then offering to turn on CNN so the ghost can see the President.

Couple of observations.  Wanda couldn't know what the ghost was thinking when she looked at her.  The ghost of course, is outside of time - in fact calling her a ghost does her a disservice - let's just call her "a person no longer on the planet."  This person no longer on the planet may have had any number of things on her mind.  One could be: "Oh, look, it's you Wanda, don't you remember when you used to live back in these days and we were friends?  Or you were someone that I knew back then?"  That's one possibility.  Or, "Wanda! I can't believe you don't recognize me.  I'm your great great great grandmother - in your family tree!"  Or just "What the heck are you doing in my room dressed like that?"

As noted here in other posts, there are many accounts from people who remember previous lifetimes where they weren't of the same race, color, creed or gender that they are now.  And they don't just remember a "day" in that lifetime - in some cases people remember the entire life, including the death, and remember the experience of leaving the body and "going home" back to their "soul group" where they hang out with their loved ones and plot their return to the planet. (For more info on that topic, click on "Flipside" or "It's a Wonderful Afterlife" for plenty of those accounts - or even "Flipside the Documentary" available as a DVD or on Gaiam TV.

Book, DVD, Audio

But what's also amazing about this clip is how "normal" it is.  Wanda saw a ghost, it didn't frighten her, she wasn't "spooked." In fact she gave the person who used to be on the planet respect and acknowledged her presence.  

And then Ellen told a story about seeing a man in a house she used to live in, and then tossed it over to her mother who also saw the same man at a different time in that house.

So we have a verification of a "person who used to be on the planet" right in this clip.  Ellen saw the man, and then later her mother saw the same man.  

So the question is - instead of running screaming into the night - how can we show compassion for this man or "people who used to be on the planet?"  Would it be to do what Wanda did, and acknowledge their presence and perhaps suggest "look around yourself person who used to be on the planet, there's a light in the distance.  If you go towards that light, go through that light, all your friends and loved ones are waiting for you to return so that you can figure out a way to get back here, or go and do whatever it is that you're supposed to do.  Don't be afraid - you've done a great job of hanging around the planet, so why not go and have some fun back home?"  

It's the fastest, easiest way to talk a person who is not longer on the planet into leaving your residence - and if they really insist that they've got to stick around, then just say "I appreciate that you want to stick around here, and that's fine by me, but please don't wake up, scare, or otherwise intimidate my guests or me.  You're welcome, but you have a choice to stay or go."  Worse thing that can happen is they take you up on the suggestion and head home.  

Meanwhile....

This month's National Geographic article on "Dolphin Intelligence" by J Foer caught my eye:

Photographs by Brian Skerry

"Bolton presses her palms together over her head, the signal to innovate, and then puts her fists together, the sign for “tandem.” With those two gestures, she has instructed the dolphins to show her a behavior she hasn’t seen during this session and to do it in unison.

Hector and Han disappear beneath the surface. With them is a comparative psychologist named Stan Kuczaj, wearing a wet suit and snorkel gear and carrying a large underwater video camera with hydrophones. He records several seconds of audible chirping between Hector and Han, then his camera captures them both slowly rolling over in unison and flapping their tails three times simultaneously.

Above the surface Bolton presses her thumbs and middle fingers together, telling the dolphins to keep up this cooperative innovation. And they do. The 400-pound animals sink down, exchange a few more high-pitched whistles, and then simultaneously blow bubbles together. Then they pirouette side by side. Then they tail walk. After eight nearly perfectly synchronized sequences, the session ends.

There are two possible explanations of this remarkable behavior. Either one dolphin is mimicking the other so quickly and precisely that the apparent coordination is only an illusion. Or it’s not an illusion at all: When they whistle back and forth beneath the surface, they’re literally discussing a plan."

and then later in the article:

"The last common ancestor of humans and chimps lived some six million years ago. By comparison cetaceans such as dolphins split off from the rest of the mammal lineage about 55 million years ago, and they and primates haven’t shared an ancestor for 95 million years."

So dolphin have been on their own evolutionary track for 55 million years... while humans have been on their own track for about 6 million.  So logic tells us that evolution would probably have done some nifty tricks in terms of these denizens of the deep over all those years.

But what the article above says, is that an instructor used sign language to ask these dolphin to do a series of tricks in unison - but the choice of the tricks and what they would do was up to them.  And then they performed those stunts in the order that they devised.

In other words, they consciously chose what tricks to perform for this human.  

They communicated with each other - in some fashion - on what those tricks would be.  

Hello. Why so crabby?

Let's not get caught up for the moment in how they communicated.  It could have been a series of clicks and whistles.  That's likely. But it's equally possible they have another form of communication that is faster than what we can measure.  I'm not saying they do. I'm not asking for pyramid hats.  I just want us all to consider this possibility; these dolphin just proved they're consciousness.

Now by logic, extend that to the planet.  All animals, all creatures are sentient.  They have their own way of communication, as we have ours.  Ours in by no means superior to theirs - in fact in this case it's proven that theirs is far superior to ours.

There's plenty of folklore of dolphin coming to the aid of humans.  Just search youtube for videos of dolphin approaching humans and trying to communicate with them, steering their boats to safety, or asking humans for help. 

In my own experience, I saw a school of dolphin surface on the Santa Monica beach, about 20 yards off shore, jumping and swimming.  As a joke I yelled "Hey, Dan Marino! (former Miami Dolphin). Over here!"  And one of their group turned and started swimming towards me.  I mean jumping out of the water, flying through the air in my direction, aiming at me as if to say "What? You called? You need help? You were speaking to me?"  I was afraid that I somehow had influenced them to screw up their path and shouted "No, sorry, I was just kidding!" and the Dolphin turned and rejoined his group.  It was funny, but startling.

Not far from here.  "Hey! Dan Marino!"

So.  This National Geographic story proves that dolphin are conscious. They speak to each other and can process complex information faster and better than humans can.  Does that mean all animals are sentient?  I would have to argue that it does. I'm sorry if that's disturbing to those who aren't vegetarians (myself included), but there's not much wiggle room in this explanation.  (Other than to say that no scientist is saying it, they're just more interested in whether they can talk to the dolphin rather than listening to what dolphin might have to tell them.)  And if they're sentient, then it behooves us to do something to protect them, including protecting Orcas (the largest dolphin) from being held in captivity. (Hello Sea World)

So what do these two stories have in common?  We experience life in a 5 dimensional world.  Well, 2 to be sure, 3 for entertainment, and the rest are about our senses.  But other animals on this planet don't experience this world the way we do.  Bees, for example, see ultraviolet light.  Dolphin obviously can communicate in ways we don't understand.  Birds, cats, dogs... cows. 

And we can't experience the world the way a person who is no longer on the planet experiences it.  But we can appreciate it.  We can honor it. We can talk about it without fear of being dunked, hanged or burnt at the stake.

So let's talk about it, shall we?

Convicted killer claims victim "forgave" him from the afterlife

This is disturbing, I know. 

An attorney approached me saying that "all of her clients" had similar accounts of victims coming to them to say versions of "I'm okay, and I can help you." 

I'm so sorry for the victims and their families to hear this with no context. I'm sorry that this is not public knowledge or that people have never discussed this in public. But it's a chapter in "It's a Wonderful Afterlife: Further Adventures in the Flipside" Volume 2, and it's EXACTLY what the victims of second degree murderers have said to the people who killed them, and told their attorney about it. 

Needless to say, they had no way to share this information with anyone - and this guy chose this moment to share it on the stand. 

I would venture that he signed up for this lifetime, and signed up for the journey to prison he will experience - but it's an unusual way to hear verification of one of the chapters in my book or that people don't really die no matter what happens to them. My sincere condolences to the victim's families.

Convicted killer Joe McEnroe detailed how he killed the Anderson family in Carnation in 2007. He explained how he shot Wayne and Judy Anderson, hid their bodies and waited for the rest of the family. “The air was smokey and smelled of blood and death, “ said McEnroe on Thursday. Photo from the KIRO TV website.

"Convicted killer: Victims aren't as mad as you'd think" by Alison Grande

Convicted killer Joe McEnroe detailed how he killed the Anderson family in Carnation in 2007. He explained how he shot Wayne and Judy Anderson, hid their bodies and waited for the rest of the family. “The air was smokey and smelled of blood and death, “ said McEnroe on Thursday.


By Alison Grande
KIRO - Seattle

SEATTLE — Thursday convicted killer Joe McEnroe had his last chance to convince the jury to spare him from the death penalty. The same jury that convicted him of murdering his girlfriend's family on Christmas Eve 2007, will decide if he will be sentenced to life in prison or the death penalty.

 McEnroe told the jury today that they victims visited him from the afterlife and "aren't as mad as you'd think."

"They said they don't blame [me]. I tried to apologize to them. It's like, look, I'm sorry for what happened," said McEnroe Thursday.


He said the victims want him to live and do good. McEnroe says he wants to help other men in prison.

"In your mind you've convinced yourself Judy Anderson is not as mad as what you might think about the murder of her two grandchildren?" asked Sr. Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Scott O'Toole.
"Yes," said McEnroe.

"This is what you've been told by them" O'Toole questioned.

"Yes sir," McEnroe responded.

Prosecutors are convinced McEnroe and Michele Anderson were motivated by greed. Investigators say Michele Anderson was upset her parents were going to start charging her for utilities in the mobile home she lived in with McEnroe on her parents Carnation property.  Detectives say the pair targeted six unsuspecting victims as they gathered on Christmas Eve. Wayne and Judy were shot first, their bodies hidden outside, the house cleaned. When Michele Anderson's brother Scott Anderson, his wife Erica and two young children - Olivia 5, and Nathan, 3, arrived - they were murdered too.

"The plan was Michele Anderson would get all that money and all that property." stated O'Toole.
 "Yes," said McEnroe.  "And you would live happily ever after." added O'Toole. “Yes, that was the plan she sold me on," McEnroe answered.

Defense attorneys got to question McEnroe one final time. "Joe, how often do you think about killing the Andersons?" asked defense attorney Bill Prestia.

McEnroe let out a loud cry, stamped his foot and answered, "It's in my mind all the time."

Prestia asked McEnroe about a statement he made on Tuesday, " You said 'Look just kill me, I don't care.' So do you care? Why don't  you just accept execution?"

“I have to make - If I just die then that's an act of further destructiveness," McEnroe said. He says he wants to help other men in prison.

"Joe, do you feel bad for killing these people?" asked Prestia.

"Words cannot express how awful this is -- how awful I feel," answered McEnroe.

McEnroe wouldn't promise he would not kill again. McEnroe said if someone was attacked in the jail he would try other things first, but if he had to he would kill. He said he would try not to let someone talk him in to killing again. But he couldn't promise it wouldn't happen, because he never thought it would have happened in the first place.

The defense will call more witnesses next week. The penalty phase will likely be in the hands of the jury in early May.

Michele Anderson's trial is scheduled for the fall.

- See more at: http://www.wsbtv.com/news/news/national/convicted-killer-says-victims-came-him-afterlife/nkw4N/#sthash.mr1e8p91.dpuf

Ben Affleck and The Flipside

Rarely do we see how silly "modern science" can be.

"Ben Affleck Asked PBS Not To Reveal Ancestry"

 (AP Photo/Cliff Owen, File

First off, let me say I've met Ben an a few occasions, in Cannes where I introduced him to Chantal Cerruti, who offered to outfit him in a suit. (I was wearing one, and was happy to make the introduction.) And then later in Santa Monica, where our kids shared a pre-school - his were stalked by paparazzi in trees hovering over the playground, mine were bouncing around the chicken coop - but he and his wife couldn't have been nicer people. 

Despite playing my way through Boston U via a piano-bar in Charlestown (The Warren Tavern) near his home - other than that proximity, I have no reason to comment on this story, other than... it's nonsense.

She agrees with me. Or at least I hope so.
Taken on the set of my film "My Bollywood Bride"

Forget for a moment, the illegal posting of private emails by Wikileaks (One thing to reveal criminal behavior on behalf of hidden agendas, and another to post emails of people who happen to work for or be affiliated with a company... mine included - as I worked on their film "Salt.")  That's beyond the pale, and for my two cents, its reputation just went into a pail.

But back to Mr. Affleck who is "accused" ("Je Accuse!") of asking a reality TV show to cut out the part where his ancestors owned slaves.

Here's the issue:  Harvard's Robert Gates, who hosts the show, claims Ben (or his reps) asked him to delete that part of the show that revealed Ben's relatives owned slaves:

"PBS and Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates, host of the show that traces the ancestry of well-known guests, said in separate statements that they didn't censor the slave-owner details. Instead, more interesting ancestors of the actor emerged and Gates chose to highlight them in October's segment featuring Affleck, they said in the statements posted on the PBS website..." 

(Professor Gates is the professor who was arrested on his porch in that tragic "arrested for being black" incident in Cambridge years ago.  Unfortunately, a victim of a centuries old amount of prejudice in the Boston area, where I went to school across the Charles River.)

And then this quote jumped out at me:

"In their email exchange, Gates asks (Sony's Michael) Lynton for advice on how to handle Affleck's request. "Here's my dilemma: confidentially, for the first time, one of our guests has asked us to edit out something about one of his ancestors--the fact that he owned slaves. Now, four or five of our guests this season descend from slave owners, including Ken Burns. We've never had anyone ever try to censor or edit what we found. He's a megastar. What do we do?" Gates wrote on July 22, 2014."

Hello?

"The fact that HE OWNED SLAVES."  Now, I imagine he's not referring to Ben Affleck here, because Ben never owned slaves.

Includes an account of someone who did own slaves... in a previous life

But this sentence goes to the heart of why this research into consciousness, into the "Flipside" is so important.  For Ben, and for Gates, who is belaboring under the concept that somehow we are our ancestors (genetically or epigenetically.) 

There's no evidence that we are our ancestors.  We don't have memories of what our ancestors did.  Under hypnosis, during a near death experience, or any other event in human history.  None. (I'm sorry all those relatives of mine, Irish and Italian who celebrate that fact every year with pasta or beer. It's nice to believe we are them, but we ain't. And it shows)

However we have tons of evidence that people have memories of previous lifetimes that weren't, could not be, were in no relation to their ancestors.  Under hypnosis, during near death experiences, and sometimes during a coma, an out of body experience, during an LSD trip - even while being "cleared" during Scientology.  People have "memories" of their previous lifetimes. Memories that can be forensically looked up and proven.

How could that be?

I can tell you what scientists say.  That it's "cryptomnesia" - or somehow remembering something they saw, or heard on tv, or imagined.  Somehow they made up these details - emotions and everything else that goes along with a previous remembrance of a lifetime.

Hypnotherapists in Iowa watching "Flipside" on DVD. 
Available on Amazon, or Gaiam TV.  Nice screening room.

But where are these memories stored?  In our DNA?  Well, that doesn't make sense, because these memories are of different races - sometimes remembering a lifetime as a slave owner (as in "Flipside") or sometimes a lifetime remembered as an Asian monk (in "Flipside" and "It's a Wonderful Afterlife.")  

What people report under deep hypnosis is that these memories are not stored in our DNA, but travel with us in the form of energetic "hard drives" - they're described in various accounts as "fractals" or some other mode of transport that retain all of our memories from previous lifetimes.  And that when we need to access them - moments of clarity, apotheosis, or in moments of fear, or nearly dying - we access them.  

Could they be part of the Jungian "pool" of consciousness, as one scientist has suggested to me?  Well that doesn't make a lick of sense either, because people who remember these past lives, remember the death scene, remember leaving the body, and when asked where they'd like to "go" they inevitably say "HOME."  As all the 26 people I've filmed under deep hypnosis say.  And then, they go "home" - where they claim they meet their loved ones, hang out with spirit guides, and generally plot their next lifetime. 

(I began "Flipside" as a documentary about Michael Newton's work as a psychologist where over 7000 people said the same things under deep hypnosis about the afterlife over 30 years prior to his publishing in 1994.  I've discovered Dr. Helen Wambach, another psychologist got the same results in her studies in the 1960's. So there's plenty of research to back up these accounts.)

I'm not hypothesizing this detail - it's not a belief or a philosophy - it's what thousands have reported.  Consistently.  Which is what science requires.

So let's start there.  

Ben Affleck should know, should be aware that he is not his ancestors.  Any more than the actress who plays Desdemona coming off stage and berating the actor who played Othello for killing her.  "It's in the play!"

(This quote, courtesy of the actress Kathy Bates, who said it at the end of last year's "American Horror Story" - which sums up perfectly what these reports of why we choose difficult lives, but there's only forgiveness in the afterlife.)

Kathy Bates in her "Freak Show" costume

So if Ben had slave owners in his memories of previous lifetimes - which like I say, occurred in someone interviewed in "Flipside" who saw and felt and experienced what it was like to beat and whip people without any feeling for them - and seeing and feeling and experiencing the horror of that experience.  

And then being told by his spirit guides that he had "transferred that anger to himself" and was still working on beating himself up over his past life behaviors, but that he's "doing better now."  (The person is a hypnotherapist, who has healed countless people in his work; Paul Aurand, former President of the Newton Institute).

Gary Schwartz PhD, author of many books 
on consciousness, "Sacred Promise" included.

Harvard's Gary Schwartz PhD wrote the introduction to "Flipside."  (He also got a PhD from Yale and ran one of their medical schools).  He's been at the forefront of studying consciousness existing outside the body, so Professor Gates might want to check into his work. 

Harvard's own Dr. Alexander wrote about his consciousness existing beyond his body.

 Or perhaps Harvard's Eben Alexander, a neurosurgeon who had a profound between life experience as recounted in "Proof of Heaven" (Proof also mean a scientific argument for, by the way) - who has personally experienced consciousness existing outside the brain.  Or perhaps look into the work of UVA's Dr. Bruce Greyson, whose epic work on near death experiences is distilled in the youtube video "Is Consciousness Produced by the Brain" where he demonstrates the many cases where people whose brains are not working, actually work in various cases.

The book by Dr. Greyson, Drs Kelly, interviewed in "It's a Wonderful Afterlife"

(80 mins that will convince you that consciousness is not confined to the brain. UVA's Dr. Bruce Greyson speaking in Dharamsala, reproduced in "It's a Wonderful Afterlife")




But no, you see, people focus on the idea that somehow Ben's stardom might have been affected by this revelation that someone in his genetic tree owned slaves.  And now, here we have the opportunity to prove that's nonsense - that he has no more responsibility for what his genetic forefathers did, than a fruit fly does for being angry that he lives for 24 hours. 

Just like people killing each other in Northern Ireland for the fact that their forefathers were of a particular religion.  There's no evidence they are their forefathers, but there is evidence that they've reincarnated on both sides of the fence.

Just like people killing each other in the Middle East. There's DNA evidence that shows Palestinians and Israelis are nearly identical in their DNA, much more so than those outside their group.  And there's no evidence that people had previously lifetimes in their genetic tree - unless they chose to do so.  And there's plenty of evidence of people reincarnating on "opposite sides of the fence."

Just like slaves and their slave owners.  There's no evidence that people remembered lifetimes as slaves (unless that was a choice they made in a previous lifetime) nor is there any evidence that people were slave owners.  However there is evidence that a boy in Ohio who is white, remembers a lifetime where he was a young girl who died in a fire in Chicago (who was black.)
Here's his story.




"It's in the data.  Data does not lie.  We only lie to ourselves about the data."  (said no one but me)


What the research in "Flipside" demonstrates, (and now in "It's a Wonderful Afterlife") over and over again is that we choose our parents each time out.  We choose our lifetime each time we decide to come here.  Yes, we can choose to be a slave owner, yes, we can choose to be a slave - and we have our own private, personal reasons for making that choice, and none of us can judge another for their choice - because we can't be in their shoes.  

And in this case, Ben chose to be here on the planet, and I applaud him for it.  But he should take this opportunity to look into the research - the real research about who he is, about why he chose to be on the planet.  He'll find it if he looks for it, if he's open to it.  To examine why he chose this particular life, this particular path.

Prior to some screening somewhere on the planet.

And that my friends, is my two cents for the day.

Epigenetics and the Afterlife

Got this email today.  About the study that shows that "cells remember previous lifetimes."

"Rich, Holy shit. Have you seen this study?

http://themindunleashed.org/2014/01/scientists-found-memories-may-passed-generations-dna.html

http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v17/n1/full/nn.3594.html

So cool. What do you think? Does this provide an alternative explanation for LBL experiences? That rather than remembering past lives, those past lives are embedded in the DNA of our brain when we’re born? Or are there still things that would be inconsistent with LBL?

Do tell…"

Epigenetics.  

They've even got a new science to spend money trying to explain it. Here's Google's tongue in cheek entry:

Epigenetics is the study of these chemical reactions and the factors that influence them. Meet the epigenome and learn how it influences DNA. Change the level of gene expression in a cell with the turn of a dial!

They tortured mice, and then the children of those mice would be afraid of those dudes who tortured them.  That was the first study.  "Mice remember FEAR!"

Well, that doesn't mean that there is only one mode of communication between a mouse and what's been happening to him.  Could be auntie or uncle mouse's ghosts whispering in their ear "Watch out for humans in white lab coats! they'll torture you!"  Could be that the white coated devils thinking of evil torture influenced the mouse.  (I'm just giving you the kind of "super denial" that I've read from scientists about consciousness existing outside the brain. That somehow the "thought" of the action has influenced the action itself.  If that's true, then its true here as well.)

In this case, as I read the study -  they expanded it to smell.  The smell of cherry blossoms.. Okay.  (We had a cherry tree in our backyard, and I can smell it now. My brother fell out of it and broke his arm. I wonder if his arm aches when he sees cherry pies? But I digress).

Is there a possibility that the ghost mice are telling them to watch out for humans who want to torture them again?  It's possible.

And it's also possible that some forms of fear - terror - are passed down genetically into the body.

Which is why I hate kneeling in church pews.  From too many times kneeling and digging up potatoes in Ireland.  My knees are predestined to hate kneelers.

But I digress.

Data is data.

What does this tell us about this test?  That there is a possibility that something gets passed down to the mice.  Could be a smell trigger, could be a sound trigger, or a light trigger - how did humans realize that sharks were dangerous? Or snakes for that matter?  Was it only from watching others get eaten?  Or is there a cell memory of that kind of terror from when we swam alongside them?  I know when I've been in shark cages and I see the open mouth of a shark coming at me, something beyond panic sets in to my "lizard brain."  It feels like memory.  I'm not saying it is.  But it feels the same.  "Oh right, I remember this. Run!"

(I used the term shark cage facetiously. I've been in aquariums where the sharks swim around you while you walk through a glass tube. Sydney Aquarium for example)

There's more - and here's where it gets fun.

Some animals already know the antidote to poison.  They weren't told or taught by their parents - but there's an animal in the bush that after being bitten by a poisonous snake knows to go and rub its wound on a particular shrub that is the antidote to the snake bite.

That's been a known fact for decades.

They discovered that a particular type of female bird "pretends" to mate for life - but actually goes out and mates when anyone who flies by in order to produce offspring.  And.. it turns out the male sperm of the bird doing the flying around has a killer sequence in it - at the end of its output - that is spermicide to any new sperm arriving in its mate.  

Like nature is trying to protect his sperm from other sperm that might (and often does) show up later. So where did that spermicide come from?  Some bird class on safe bird sex?

So let's ask - "What's the difference between animals who use their genetic memory to keep them alive and humans?" 

Animals - human animals included - must have certain "cellular memories" or "epigenetic memories" in order to keep the species alive.  

Humans are NOT ANY DIFFERENT THAN ANIMALS. (Since we can't prove or even define consciousness, we can't rule out that animals are conscious as well, can we?)

So, there's one "how do you do" moment that science has found a way to prove.

But now go a step further.  

Thousands of people - and of course it's 100's of thousands, over the course of history - remember previous lifetimes.  And these previous lifetimes aren't in their same genetic tree - sometimes they remember being asian, african, caucausian, male, female, etc... and if you look hard enough you'll see the forensic research that matches their accounts.  

So they can't be remembering someone in their family tree - if their family tree doesn't include this particular lifetime.  

But what are they remembering?

Science (tries to) tell us that it's a "pool of consciousness" as described by Carl Jung.  This geriatric pool of stored memories, that must go somewhere after someone dies, because energy doesn't die, it just moves elsewhere, so when someone is "remembering" a different lifetime, they're merely remembering "bits and pieces of a particular lifetime that happens to be out in the universe." (I've heard this theory from more than one scientist.)

But that doesn't make a lick of sense either.  Because people don't remember bits and pieces - when they're properly interviewed about their memory.  They remember the death, and then what happens after that.  The traveling back to their "home" - the between lives realm where they get to reconnect with their loved ones who talk to them about information they never knew (New information) where they learn about people who are dead they didn't know were dead (New information) they have life reviews from various points of view not only their own (New information) and they find themselves remembering the conversations they had before coming to this lifetime and why they would do so.

So it's not quite the same as the body flinching when you put a knife to it - or smell the sent of Cherries (unless you were drowned in a vat of Cherries in a previous lifetime, or even choked on a pit) - then you too might flinch the way these mice have flinched.. from their "epigentic memory."

What they're doing is proving that we are human animals - but completely avoiding the research to understand and examine how we are also spiritual creatures AT THE SAME TIME.

We are both animals and spirits.  We are perfect combination of the two.  And one has a physical evolution that requires DNA, requires a safe environment, requires being able to be born, grow up, reproduce and pass away.  And one has a spiritual evolution that includes previous lifetimes, current lifetimes, and future lifetimes, each with its own version of "graduation" from one level to the next.  At least that's what the reports show.  That's what the research shows.

So sure, why not?  We have cell memories.  Might help us in a fight with a poisonous snake (if we can only remember the name of that shrub - which I can't for the life of me.)  And yes, we have spiritual memories that we appear to be able to access on a daily basis - and often on a nightly basis.

OK. I FOUND IT: "The roots of the plant “chota – chand” in Nepal were found to be antidote for snake-bite, a fact learnt after watching mongooses feeding on the plant before fighting cobras. Man may not after all be the only sapient animal."

and that's my two cents for the day.  RM