Hi forum.

I really love the approach that experiments and tests and verifications could be done in every part of our life, even for afterlife knowledge.

It has actually changed some beliefs of mine for good.



Lately I've been thinking though that nothing can be known or understood for sure,
Let's say that I do a retrieval and I confirm some data from what I got with my imagination (and I have done it twice),

How can we know that the deceased communicated this to me , isn't this an assumption? Couldn't I assume also that there is a layer in nature where all the human thoughts are stored, and I just picked my evidence from there?

Every thought from forum or Bruce would be welcomed and much appreciated.
Thanks.

Hi Giannis. You rather hit the nail on the head there for me too.

While I've had some interesting experience that's both enabled opening and created a knowing (can't claim the cinerama of some here), we're generally left without independent verification except in cases where information comes back that can afterwards be verified in this consciousness.

Another issue for me is that many of the techniques involve visualisation, and are open to the supposition that it's not for real, just our imagination. The object/subject scientific paradigm tends to bias us to think this way.

I guess for me it just comes down to trust in my own process, and the fact some of this experience just has that indefinable sense of realism about it.

But it's almost like it's a test of faith, or if not faith at least of openness or ability to perceive beyond  common beliefs. Signs are that it's all set up that experience requires openness to possibility, and that requires at least minimal conditoned belief. If not active involvement in creation of whatever phenomenon it is we perceive.

The big question for me is not so much whether or not experience is for real. It's rather whether or not the sort of mind made conceptual framework we've built to describe how alternate realities work is likely to be true to the reality given the constraints of our space/time/cause/effect oriented tiny intellects.

I can't help thinking that maybe we get flashes, but not the whole story. There for example seems not to be a lot of experiential information (beyond that handed down by the various spiritual traditions) around on how our movement through the afterlife is actually controlled.

Or am I wrong, do some of you have direct communication on this issue?

Hi Gannis-
There is no way yet discovered to absolutely, positively, and for certain, prove that a specific message came from a spirit, dead friend, a past lifetime recollection, or your subconscious. It's an experimental quagmire.

The way that most of us decide that we are getting useful information from "somewhere else" is that it makes sense, fits into reasonable expectations, and often brings information not otherwise available, and not expected. That still leaves room for doubt.

The other reason that many of us are convinced is that after accepting, at least tentatively, that there is "something out there", is that we have personal experiences that are lucid and deeply moving in some manner.

This is a sort of "Catch 22", in that you have to be open to have exotic experiences, which means willing to accept them if they arrive. However, by meditating, such as using Bruce's soul retrieval methods (a useful form of meditation), eventually we allow the expectations and attachments to relax away and some kind of experience arises. Whatever it is, generally it will be powerful, and will leave you feeling  as if you have learned something and developed unexpected insights.

But - that's not proof. Even if your Great Aunt Gussie came through a told you where the family treasure is buried, it still is not proof - at least not in the scientific sense. However, if you can actually dig up the treasure, or otherwise apply the nformation received, it seems to be a fair bet that it is to some degree genuine. That's about as good as it gets from this side.

However, if you'll wait for fifty or a hundred years you'll get the answer from the other side.  :-)

See you there-
dave

One of the major factors in Bruce’s books is that he finally stopped questioning everything and accepted his experiences as valid.  For those of us who are physically impaired there is always going to be some way to doubt and question our own experience.  Ultimately if those experiences seem reasonably consistent and helpful we just waste energy by questioning them.

The difficulty for me, like Dave suggests, is that I need to relax enough so that my mind is open to these non-physical experiences.  I need to stop imposing my physical world and left brained expectations on what I experience and just let the experiences take their own course without all that questioning or attempts to force it into some preconceived and “acceptable” physical world form.  That openness, I suspect, is right brained and emotional and feeling based and I’ve kind of been brain washed into not trusting it.  But I’m working on it as I suspect most of us on Bruce’s board are.

Rob


Quote:

However, by meditating, such as using Bruce's soul retrieval methods (a useful form of meditation), eventually we allow the expectations and attachments to relax away and some kind of experience arises.

 As usual, great advice from Dave.

Hi Giannis, was wondering if anyone here has tried the 3x3 breath exercise or any relaxation technique before doing a retrieval?

there is an exercise call NEW. you bring the imaginary light energy up through the feet and gathering it into an expanding cloud in a circle. about 20 minutes of this and I did my first conscious retrieval without going to sleep. (my usual method)

not losing consciousness was the key for me that this was real and erased doubts. but my first retrievals before the exercise, I'm not sure about whether they were exercises to get to the reality part, or what they were exactly, but I'm sure every imagery that a soul does where our intentions are to be of service, will build that into a visible aura that lets guides know, we are available and willing to do what we can. and it was always rewarding to be in training too.

but NEW...oh wow...I'd like to find others who did it, it was so mind blowing and uplifting, just to be able to really assist someone, makes you feel it in the heart, not just the mind.

love, alysia