I finally got around to doing the first retrieval exercise a couple of days ago. I didn't really see or hear or feel anything during it at all and most of it came with the feeling like I was making it up as I went along but I kept going with it and seeing what I came up with. Hopefully if I can do enough of these my nonphysical perception will become clear to the point where I actually see, hear and feel things and maybe I'll find some verification that this was real. The feeling like I was making it all up as I went along was still quite strong but I'll share what I've gotten out of this one and my memory combined with my paraphrasing of what I wrote in my notebook here.

I walked through the forest path that Bruce spoke of. It was initially twilight sunrise or sunset until I heard Bruce's voice say to imagine small rays of sunshine coming down through some of the leaves. In fact there were a few moments where Bruce's narration on the CD changed what I was seeing but that's another story. I got to the stone bench and asked for a helper. She was a smaller adult woman, probably in her 30s with curly sandy blonde to light brown hair and she was wearing a white dress. I don't remember getting a name from her although one interesting thing was that at the stone bench at the beginning she looked more fairy or angel like initially and when we went to the scene and everywhere after, she looked more human like. We went to the place where the retrieval was supposed to go. I got a last name as I went there in my mind in a similar fashion to a word showing up as you remember it. There was a husky man who appeared to be in his late 60s lying on a raw wood floor in an open room with an exposed wooden beam ceiling. He was dressed in a flannel shirt and hat and looked a lot like comedian Jonathan Winters. He seemed very disoriented. When I asked his first name he said William. When I asked his last name I just got a jumble like several different names at once and I could make out a few individually but instead I'm sticking with the last name I got before entering the scene for now. I noticed that I was trying to expedite the retrieval experience ahead of Bruce's narration so it took a little will power to suppress that. When I asked his cause of death he said he didn't know or remember at first, then he said something else like he had just remembered but at that point the words became distorted like a bunch of different causes being stated at once. When I asked about hobbies he said he liked horseback riding and that there was someone he wanted to see again. I just cut to the chase and asked him, "Do you know this woman?" I was introducing him to my helper. He recognized her and smiled and she helped him up and they talked for a bit. They were about to leave when I asked if I could tag along at the prompt of Bruce's voice on the recording. The scene dissolved and transitioned into a different scene in which we were in a large dirt field with low wooden beam partition fences. There were horses. The woman who was the helper got on one and then encouraged William to get on another. They rode around in the field for a bit. It was just the two of them plus a few extra horses and myself, and then Bruce's voice on the recording asked if there were any other people. There was no one at first and then a man with a plaid shirt and a big moustache came riding in on another horse and he said, "Hey, Bill!" William recognized this man and they talked for a bit while still on their horses. Eventually I left the scene with the helper but as I was leaving, I noticed something a little strange. There was an identical looking woman (to our helper) on the same horse the helper was on as we moved away but my helper was still beside me and slightly ahead of me as well. My helper said Bill was doing great. I asked for something that I could use to verify the experience but didn't remember getting anything during the exercise. However, after it was all over with and I was writing in my notebook, I had the image of her holding some kind of necklace. I did do some google image searching to see if I could find a similar necklace but couldn't find one. I almost forgot to thank her and stayed long enough for the recording of the belief system retrieval exercise to start so that I could do that before leaving. Sometimes I wonder if this was real or just me making this up as I went along. Sometimes I get images of Bill smiling on his horse at this ranch. Sometimes I get what seems to be just a replay of the previous experience where the helper lady just says Bill is doing great. I suppose I may get some kind of verification later or maybe I'll be able to go back and check when my non physical perception becomes much sharper and clearer. All in all this was a start and this was my first retrieval experience. Any thoughts?

Hey David,

You kept saying you didn't see, hear, or feel anything but to me it sure sounds like you did.  Sometimes when we write down or retell our experiences we realize how much we really did experience.  Sometimes stuff comes back to you in the recording phase, which is why it's good to write things out.  As you get some practice and experience under your belt you will be able to tell the difference between the kind of "real" that these nonphysical experiences are and what it's like to just make things up, and you'll stop comparing that kind of reality to physical reality experience. 

So when you say you didn't really see, hear, or feel anything you realize you actually did, you just experienced it in a nonphysical way. 

Also, I noticed you said Bruce's narration changed what you were seeing.  That's a good sign that you were allowing your imagination to do its own thing rather than stay alert waiting to be told what to do.  It takes practice and patience and persistence to learn how to balance both of those things, meaning that you just allow things to happen without judging or analyzing them. 

I think you had a great experience here.  I think the identical woman on the horse after your helper walked away with you was a neat effect of your helper showing she was in two places at once.  You shared a really nice experience.  I really liked it.

Thanks for the input, everyone. Vicky, I think what I mean is that I don't really see anything in full color or hear anything in full sound but things are just like when you read a book and your imagination forms the imagery or when you're remembering something that happened a while ago. It's very similar to imagination and my imagination has also many times produced material that would later prove to be verifiably false so that makes it difficult to distinguish between the two. I'm definitely planning on doing more of these until I can discern the difference a little more or until my nonphysical senses sharpen enough that I can see and hear a bit more clearly than imagined scenes. At some point or another when my nonphysical senses become much sharper it might be nice for me to go check on Bill and see how he's doing or if I can replay the retrieval in hopes that I can remember a bit more more clearly. I will definitely post more experiences as I get them. Thanks again, everyone!