It all started with The Secret. New Year’s Eve 2011/12 in fact. The film version showed up on Netflix and, out of curiosity, I watched it. For those not familiar with The Secret, it describes a three-step method of manifesting things you desire: Ask, Receive, Believe.
I had heard about the book by Rhonda Byrne years before, but at that time I didn’t believe in such positive-thinking pop-psychology mumbo-jumbo. But that night as I watched, I was intrigued. And it sounded like fun. “Can’t hurt to try it,” I thought. And I did. And it seemed to work.
From there I looked into some of the speakers featured in the film, as well as the source material. This material included the “New Thought” movement of early 20thcentury America, as well as the Law of Attraction, a more modern concept promoted by Jerry and Esther Hicks via the channeled entity “Abraham.” For the next three years, I feverishly explored countless spiritual traditions. From early 19thcentury Russian esotericism to bizarre channeled material and everything in between.
It’s been a wild ride to say the least. I’m still exploring, but things have slowed down significantly. As I learned and pondered and practiced, I eventually settled into what works best for me – as each seeker should. I’ll be posting about all of that eventually, but here I share some key reflections on my time in “Woo-Woo Land”.
Each Person’s Spiritual Journey is Unique
As I interacted with others seeking enlightenment, it became clear to me that each person’s journey is unique. I’ve had friends whose spiritual path led them down avenues very different than mine. For example, I know people keen on Theosophy, but that didn’t interest me much. Also, whereas I found information about the afterlife in the work of Michael Newton, others have explored it through the work of Delores Cannon. Neither is better than the other – it just depends on what material speaks to you.
This doesn’t surprise me, since I’ve come to appreciate more than ever that every person is an amazing one-of-a-kind divine creation.
I Let Curiosity Be My Guide
Some describe the venture into the unknown as falling down the rabbit hole. My journey is more like a cave system – a vast and unwieldy system of tunnels. One resource would lead me to another. My curiosity took me on many twists and turns – and to more than one dead end.
But that’s what worked for me. It’s how I’ve always been. Curious. Very, very curious. And I believe intuition plays a role. When something draws your attention, it’s worth pursuing.
And yet, there is such a thing as information overload. There were times when I had to take a break. Take a step back and get some perspective. While we are spiritual beings, we also need to function in the physical world. It’s important to have balance.
I Got Immersed, But Not Sucked In
While I approached everything with an open mind, I avoided becoming “a believer” in any particular teaching. For sure, I resonated with some material more than others. But I’ve never been a “joiner”. Instead, I try things out, sift and sort. Eventually, I might settle into embracing a viewpoint, but I know it might be temporary.
Currently, my exploration has led me to be “pretty sure” about the existence of certain things, such as reincarnation. But that’s all I can say with confidence: that I’m pretty sure these things exist. And I’m pretty okay with that.
I Experienced “Energy” Firsthand
The concept of “energy” is prominent within the New Age community. This energy has different names: Qi or Chi, Prana, lifeforce, etc. It is the basis for acupuncture, reiki, and other healing modalities. Some people can see it, some can feel it, and some can manipulate it. But despite electricity-based diagnostic tools like EKG and EEG, it is not fully acknowledged by mainstream science or Western medicine.
I, too, was skeptical at first. Early on in my interactions with New Agers, I just played along when they’d talk about energy. My thoughts were, “I don’t know what the heck you’re talking about, but go for it. If you want to play around with this energy thing, go right ahead. But I ain’t feeling a thing.” Then one day I did feel it. I was on a phone conference and the group was sending energy to someone who was sick. And, “Bam!” I felt this wave of pressure around my head. I thought, “Oh! That’s what that feels like! Wow! Whoa!”
Since then, I’ve felt this energy only a handful of times. But these experiences were enough to convince me without a doubt that it exists. And that it is an essential part of our bodies and thus a key component of healing. Western medicine has finally come to acknowledge the “mind-body” connection. Next step is to add the “spirit” or energy component. That might take a while.
I Came to Truly Believe in the “Non-Physical”
Related to, but separate from, the energy discussed above is the concept I like to call “Non-Physical”. This could best be likened to the idea of a “soul”, but it goes beyond that. As an atheist for most of my life, I didn’t believe in a soul. I considered religious teachings about an afterlife to be an insidious form of control. While I still do not concur with these religious doctrines, I have come to believe that we continue after physical death. Not only that, but I believe we are eternal beings that reincarnate into physical bodies many, many, many times.
Can I prove it? Not necessarily. But I find the hundreds of reports of near-death experiences overwhelmingly compelling. These cannot be explained by anomalous brain activity – many reports are from people who were clinically brain-dead. And how do you explain someone being able to see objects and activity in the operating room when their eyes were taped shut?
I like to say, “We’ll all know the answer eventually.”
I Learned to be Cautious with “Channeled” Material
Quite a bit of what I explored was “channeled material”. “Channeling” is kind of the modern term for mediums – people who allow spirits or non-physical entities to speak through them. While some of the material seems sincere, eventually I learned about “distortion” and “tricksters”.
Distortion is what it sounds like – the information is distorted. This occurs due to a couple of factors. Sometimes the channel – or connection – itself is not 100%, so portions of the information are missed or jumbled. Other times – more often I think – the person doing the channeling distorts the message with their own biases. Their own fear or lack of confidence can even block information.
Trickster entities aim to trick or deceive you. They may come pretending to be a benevolent entity, but their messages are misleading. The work of John Keel and others who have studied the paranormal have convinced me that this is a real possibility.
These concerning aspects do not, however, make me discount channeled material completely. There is a lot of insightful and helpful information available from channeling. After all, isn’t God a non-physical entity who transmitted the Ten Commandments to Moses?
I’m More Suspicious of Messages from Non-Terrestrial Beings (i.e. Aliens)
Perhaps one of the most “out there” phenomena I encountered in my New Age explorations were messages from “The Galactic Federation”. These are supposedly beings from other planets who are watching events on Earth – sometimes on a “mothership” orbiting the planet. Some people say they have been contacted by these beings, who have important messages for us. Some of these messages are warnings about how we are destroying the planet with pollution and destructive resource extraction. In the years following the 2008 financial crisis, I heard about plans for a non-terrestrial intervention to establish a new monetary system that would free humanity. Yeah, right.
I do believe it is highly probable that there is other life in the universe. And some of the stories from alien contactees/abductees are quite compelling. In fact, there are cases like Nobel Laureate Dr. Kary Mullis who attributes some of his scientific discoveries to alien abduction experiences. So I don’t completely discount the idea. However, I personally don’t put much stake in conspiracy theories involving alien species and control of planet Earth.
In Summary
As I said at the beginning, each person’s journey is unique. You must decide for yourself what is useful. I’d simply advise you to keep some common sense as well as an open mind. This can be challenging, since often the journey requires us to rethink some of our existing beliefs. This can make it hard to trust your “BullS*%!” detector. But I believe we all have one – a gut feeling, that is. It just takes some time to figure out the difference between judgement based on socialization (and fear) and discernment based on your own inner knowing.
Here’s an analogy that might help. As people – especially young people – we instinctively know that hurting another person is wrong. But we might be given teachings contrary to this – that people who are different from us are somehow less deserving and it’s okay to cause them pain. Even if we act upon the teachings, our gut will tend to resist. We all know the saying: “Deep down, you know it’s wrong.” (Or it’s parallel, “Deep down, you know it’s right.) Let your “deep down” intuition be your guide and see where it takes you.
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