Different views by different viewers - why do different witnesses havedifferent views of the same UFO event?

In the December, 2015 Minnesota MUFON meeting, we had a video presentaion, followed by a discussion to mark the 35th anniversary of the Rendlesham forest/Bentwaters/Woodbridge encounter in the UK, at Christmastime in 1980. In this case the military base was visited by a series of UFO encounters in which one or more UFOs landed in the woods a few miles from the east gate of the base. During the event, two airmen observed the UFO at very close range. At one point one of the witnesses approached and touched the object, observing the exterior of the craft in detail. At another point one or more of the witnesses were apparently taken inside of the object. Subesequently, the two airmen described very different impressions of the object and of their interactions with it, even though they had both been close to the same object and had observed it closely at the same time.

Subsequent to the MN MUFON meeting, I received a question by e-mail asking how, in the Rendlesham Forest case or any other otherworldly experience, different people appear to perceive/experience very different things as part of the same event. 

In short, I wish I knew the answer. I think we can only speculate on the reason (triggers, mechanisms, etc.) that perceptions seem to vary between witnesses. But we've noted repeatedly how this seems to occur in many high strangeness UFO cases. I suspect the answer could cut to the core of the close phenomenon. 

Whitley Strieber has some major examples of it in his books. I'm going from memory here, but I recall him pointing out in Communion that in some of his encounters, different witnesses had very different perceptions of many of the events in his book. Similarly, in many multiple witness cases, I've noted that different witnesses seem to have widely varying descriptions of the UFO. In many close sightings and encounters, the UFO seems to be in a place and time in which it could not possibly remain unseen, such as hovering over a busy freeway, over downtown, etc. Yet apparently few if any additional people notice it. 

In a lot of events of the fourth kind, there appears to be an interaction between the phenomenon and the consciousness of the experiencer. Perhaps this is some kind of metaphysical or parapsychological effect, a transformation of the experiencer's reality. Alternatively, it could simply be selective human perception. Several classic case studies where witnesses observing a crime (or some other event) show that subsequent descriptions of the event vary widely.   

Seeing a robber running from the bank, witnesses might have very different descriptions of what the robber was wearing. Seeing a UFO, witnesses often have very different descriptions of the object, even though they all saw the same thing. In many ways, I think this just boils down to human interpretation of whatever events they have witnessed.  Another example that often amazes me. Every so often, I will see a movie or a television show that I saw once before as a kid. When I see it again as an adult, the show looks very different from what I remember from so many years before. It seems like a different show, yet I know it is the sameone I observed many years before. 

To me, this just goes to show the plasticity in our memory and perception.  In the case of the Bentwaters encounter(s), it may be that Penniston and Burroughs had different connections with the phenomenon. In the first event, one was knocked to the ground - and may have been taken inside the object, while the other was outside looking closely at the glyphs on the exterior of the craft. If I recall correctly, Penniston remembered the object as being black, triangular, with lettering/glyphs on the side. Burroughs remembered the object as a large ball or mass of light. In the second encounter, Penniston and another security crewman ran toward the object. Penniston disappeared into the light while the other airman apparently went to ground - tripping or diving over a log on the forest floor. Again, the two men seemed to have different descriptions of the object.  

Since we really don't know what is going on in the CE4/AN4 phenomenon, it is nearly impossible to say what the actual triggers or mechanisms are for the difference in perceptions between one witness and another. This is another one of those fascinating questions in the mystery of UFOs, anomalies and close encounters. 

Why do different people look at the same event and observe very different things? Ultimately, I can only say I wish I knew the answer.

.

UFOlogy at the Hotel California -- Notes from the 2015 MUFON Conferene

UFOlogy at the Hotel California - Notes from the 2015 MUFON Conference 

©2015 Craig R. Lang, MS CHt 

 

"Relax said the night man, we are programmed to receive. You can check out any time 

you like, but you can never leave..." 

 

At the time of writing this article I've been home from the 2015 MUFON conference for over a month.  The conference was held at the Hotel Irvine, Thursday September 24th through Sunday September 27th and it was one hell of a weekend. I learned a lot of stuff, met a lot of great people and experienced some fascinating mysteries. I attended the field investigation workshop on Thursday, then the state directors meeting on Friday, followed by lectures on Saturday and Sunday. This article talks about a few of the talks at the conference I found to be the most interesting and useful. It also touches on a frightening darker element of the mystery that emerged during the weekend. 

 

Thursday, I learned (reviewed, actually) some fascinating new tools for use during field investigations, 

and refreshed my understanding of some of the latest procedures. Much of this was actually a review of what we learned in October, at the advanced Field Investigator boot camp. But it was very useful and covered a lot of ground. Especially for the new FI's in the room (and there were a lot of them), it was a great opportunity to learn more about how the FI process works, what the steps are, and what the paperwork entails. So far, I didn't see too many grimaces of panic at the thought of paperwork. But then it's only been a few days since the conference... :-) 

 

The state director's meeting was another time to see the inner workings of the MUFON organization. And I came away from the meeting with a tremendous sense of optimism. The organization is growing. We are undertaking some very interesting work - including the development of a new, upgraded UFO reporting and database system, and a monitoring and analysis system which we will eventually deploy around the country (and world?) to catch 'em in flight.  

 

Dubbed UFOTOG2, this will include a set of cameras, field detection and measurement, radiation 

sensors, etc. The intent will be to observe UFOs in real time, and to some extent, confirm how they just might work - which gets us back to the physics topic described above. 

  

Some of the biggest wake-up moments for me occurred during the two lectures I went to on physics. For the last few months, I've been trying to re-ramp-up on things I learned in my undergraduate years - far longer ago than I want to think about. This included relativity, quantum mechanics, Maxwell's equations, etc.  

 

So in the last few months I have been trying to re-learn the math behind relativity. To say the least it's 

mind-bending. So I thought the talk on UFO physics really hit the point - at least for me. He talked about an older theory - Kaluza Klein or KK theory - behind gravity and electromagnetics. KK theory is  something that contemporary physicists have discounted but which ultimately has led to string theory.

It turns out that the 'discounting' may have been a bit premature, to say the least. KK theory postulates that we live in a five-dimensional universe - four dimensions being our space-time continuum, with a fifth being another spatial dimension we cannot perceive. Kaluza first came up with the theory at about the time of Einstein's general relativity. Yet, since we do not perceive the 5th dimension, scientists of the day needed a way to explain that away. So along came Oscar Klein, who explained how higher dimensions could exist but not be observed. 

 

The process is called compactification - essentially, these dimensions are rolled up into closed spheres or cylinders, too small for us to notice. But one problem with that idea is that the size of the 'roll-ups' is arbitrary - how small are the tiny cylinders, and what determines that? (In an ideal theory of physics, nothing is left to chance - as physicists would say, a free parameter, undetermined by the theory itself. This is one of the "Holy Grail's of theoretical physics.) 

 

KK theory has the advantage that, while formulated in five dimensions, when viewed in four dimensions (space + time), the mathematics of relativity and electromagnetism fall out of the equations. This is a big insight, and many physicists have never given up on KK theory for just this reason. 

 

In addition, a third field besides gravity and EM also shows up - what we call the "scalar field" (Note: I had always wondered just what the scalar field or 'scalar waves' were. Now, I see that this is where they come from). Contemporary physics has largely discounted this as no apparent particle has been observed corresponding to this scalar field. Yet perhaps they are present in a way not yet understood. This is another big adventure for many in the new science community. 

 

The biggest breakthrough has been in the last year, where a new version of "M" theory (M meaning membrane). It postulates that ours and other universes are four dimensional surfaces (or 'branes’) in higher dimensional space-time. This gives us our fifth dimension (and/or more), and nicely solves what I call "the rollup problem". 

 

In the talk on UFO physics, Dr. Schroeder used KK theory and the 5D as a backdrop of his ideas on how a field propulsion mechanism could work. He briefly flashed up the Einstein field equations (General Relativity in all its brutal glory), and then said we could stop panicking now...  He was done with the ugly math. The rest was pretty intuitive. 

 

Bottom line - at least in principle, field propulsion is possible, so is interstellar flight. Many descriptions of UFO close sightings describe behavior with would make sense according to this model. So, my interpretation of this is that if they can do it, so can we. 

 

Note: I know the critics of 'nuts and bolts' are going to come down on me. And in a sense they would be right. This describes some UFO manifestations. But it does not explain the more metaphysical cases. It merely describes how a large piece of metal and electronics could travel between our pale blue dot, and other dots (of various colors) out there in the cosmos. But the biggest take-away for me was the core of the nuts and bolts engineering idea: "we can do this too..." 

Another talk I attended was on "How to talk to an alien". In this talk, the speaker described her research  into reports throughout the world UFO-encounter of different forms of communication with (and among) "Them". She discussed writing, telepathy, spoken language, and other areas of alien interaction. But again, the bottom line to me was that this is something we can (at least in principal) understand. 

 

I was most struck with her examples of alien writing. In work with experiencers, I have asked them to sketch some of the symbols and writing they have seen while onboard the - well, whatever they go onboard of. As a result, a number of experiencers have sketched some pretty extensive script. Furthermore, at least one experiencer I have worked with appears to have been able to read the script written by another experiencer. 

 

After her talk, went up to her table and in addition to buying her book, getting her signature on it, and chatting for a while (to the annoyance of the people behind me in line), I showed her the writing samples on my website. She told me they looked remarkably similar to the script in the files of the late Budd Hopkins, as well as of David Jacobs and numerous other researchers. I have seen indications of this, but so far linguistic analysis is still one of those things on the to-do list. 

 

The final, and probably the ultimate aspect of the weekend was a series of close encounters, yes real ones, that at least one person (possibly more) had during the weekend. I discuss this in my CE4 Corner article for this month, “The mystery gets real.” It shows that while UFOlogy is a science in itself, we are probably not the only scientists. The intelligence behind phenomenon is studying us just as intensely, or maybe even more so, than we are studying it. Regardless of the outcome of the (currently ongoing) investigations to these events, they add a new urgency to the question of what is going on. And they remind us that for some the phenomenon is a real inescapable presence in their life. 

 

So what are we to make of all this? I don't know. To me, it's yet another fascinating, powerfully-real, in-your-face twist in the mystery. 

 

After the conference on Sunday, we were also treated to another show - the super-moon and total eclipse. The moon turned into a deep blood-red disk that almost looked like it would disappear. Then, right on schedule, God returned the moon to us as we watched from the roof observation deck of the Irvine Hotel. It seemed like a fitting ending to the events of the weekend. And with the anomaly events of the weekend, the blood red moon seemed to mark for me the beginning of a new, deepening chapter in the mystery of close encounters. 

 

I came away from the conference even more deeply dedicated to exploring both the hard realities, and the subjective experience that together make up the UFO mystery. As the song says, "you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave..." 

The mystery gets real

This the draft of my November/December CE4 Corner article -- The mystery gets real. It will be appearing in this month's MN MUFON Newsletter. You can find the Journal isssues at http://www.mnmufon.org/mmj

Let me know what you think.

-----

The last month or so since the MUFON conference has been a powerful time in my life, and in 

the lives of many around me. For whatever reason, the currents of events in peoples' lives have 

seemed to reach a turbulent point. No less true for the close encounter phenomenon. 

 

I have gotten a number of calls from experiencers, frightened and traumatized, sometimes 

calling late at night. What happened? I can only guess. Memories are usually fragmentary yet 

the experiences were powerfully and painfully real. This was coupled with a set of experiences 

that I was apparently part of, which occurred at the conference itself, which demonstrate the 

impact that encounters with the unexplained can have on a person's life. 

 

Friday night of the conference, we had a great time, one of those let-your-hair-down evenings 

spent on the dance floor. It lasted into the night. Then, with a few beers in my system and a lot 

of energy burned on the dance floor I packed it in, looking forward to another great day at the 

conference. The next day, I learned that one of the people at the conference had had a 

somewhat different experience that evening - a rather unearthly one.  

 

Since we were both conference attendees, I was able to interview the experiencer several times 

the following day. She described the event in increasing detail during the day as memories of 

the event emerged within her mind. Sometime late in the day, she described how she had been 

taken aboard a craft hovering over the hotel. She also described seeing others from the 

conference aboard the craft, apparently taken in the same manner she had been. Were the 

people she observed actually present or were they screen memories? Was this event a classic 

abduction or did something else happen that we do not understand? I don't know. Since I was 

apparently one of the people, the suggestion I might have been there took me by surprise - I 

had no memory or indication of any CE4 event that evening. Yet whatever the truth may be, it 

was clear something frightening and powerful did happen to her, and perhaps to others.  

 

The last day of the conference, it happened again - only this time, the event was even more 

terrifying for the experiencer. She described a frightening encounter, again involving people 

that she first saw as familiar faces. The effect was powerful, leaving her traumatized all morning 

as she left on the flight home from the conference.  

 

I learned of the events after I arrived home myself, talking with her soon thereafter. I 

interviewed her once more, as did a couple of other investigators. And as she described the 

events it was apparent that much of what she recalled was likely also screen memories. Once 

again, what happened to her is not known. But we know that a powerful event occurred and 

left a lasting traumatic effect on her psyche. 

 

Over the next week, I received several other unrelated calls from experiencers, also very 

frightened. The experiences they described were similarly cryptic and traumatic. In more than 

one case, the experiencer described people resembling people she knew, being part of the abduction. In each case, they were either being taken at the same time, or were somehow in 

league with the visitors. In at least one case, the vision of people she knew being involved in 

these events left the experiencer with a deep feeling of mistrust - feeling betrayed by the very 

people she most trusted. The end result was confused, disoriented thinking and intense fear, 

life turned upside down.  

 

What do we do when the frightening and unexplained happens to someone? What can we say? 

How can we help the person who has had such unwelcome attention from "Them"? Probably 

the best thing we can do is to listen. Offer an ear, and any support we can. Most importantly, 

we must not judge - we must avoid drawing any conclusions regarding what happened.  

 

The phenomenon can present us with a hall of mirrors. What we see on the surface, familiar 

faces involved with "Them", often turns into illusion. Yet we do not know what the reality is. 

Seldom is there any physical evidence. Even though in several cases there have been tantalizing 

suggestions of traces, the phenomenon remains frustratingly and elusive.  

 

The phenomenon presents us with paradoxes, impossible memories and illogical sequences of 

events - trauma with little or no evidence. It brings us a full spectrum of mystery. Yet what to 

one person might be an interesting puzzle or even a source of wonder, to another can be an 

object of terror. Hearing the voice of an experiencer shortly after an encounter can quickly 

remind us how the phenomenon is far more than an object of curiosity. Rather, it can be a 

devastating monkey wrench in the gears of life. At a time like this, to the experiencer the 

mystery can get very, very real.  

I hope he's wrong...

What is going on in our skies? More important, what is the reason benind the UFO and close encounter phenomenon? In decades of UFO researcch, including nearly 20 years of close encounter narratives, experiencers have described increasingly consistent patterns in their encounters. The phenomenon is extensive, intruding in the lives of people across all cultures, social, political and economic strata. It appears to have an agenda, a plan, a goal. So just what is the phenomenon up to?

I just got done reading the book, "Walking Among Us," by David M Jacobs. Like his previous book, The Threat, this book is a spooky read. It portrays a dark scenario of alien infiltration and describes how "They" have carefully laid plans to take over our world. It is an alien invasion by stealth.

In summary, Walking Among Us makes the following points:

- The UFO phenomenon is a nuts and bolts intervention in our society.

- Paranormal, metaphysical and/or spiritual models of the phenomenon are incorrect.

- Our alien visitors do not have positive intent. Positive views of alien visitation are not correct.

- These beings have been carefully monitoring and intervening in our affairs for hundreds of years.

- They are conducting their operations in secrecy, avoiding public scrutiny.

- They have conducted a careful, selective breeding/genetics program resulting in the creation of human(oid) beings with a mix of human and alien characteristics.

- Human-Alien hybrids (Jacobs refers to them as "hubrids") are now present on Earth in large numbers.

- Their task is to study and then integrate/assimilate into our society.

- Their intent is to assume positions of authority in our society and ultimately usurp control.

- At a time referred to as "The Change" they will take over over the earth, bringing it (and us) into their dominion.

This scenario is consistent with some interesting observations which researchers (including myself) have noted in recent years. Among them is the appearance of apparently-human but very unusual entities. Many experiencers have described encounters with these "human-aliens." Are these the beings Dr. Jacobs describes? Descriptions of them would fill books in their own right, but the overall description would be of a person who is very psychic, does not have a clearly traceable origin or life story, and who appears to be awkward and out of place in our society. This does lend credence to some of the ideas presented in The Threat and Walking Among Us.

Dr. Jacobs describes a high degree of consistency between the narratives of his clients. He claims that most narratives seem to support the overeall scenario. What are we to make of this result? 

Claims made by Dr. Jacobs in his books, particularly about hypnosis, have especially given me pause.

- Hypnosis can accurately recover memories of experiencers (abductees) interactions with "Them."

- Hypnosis must be done correctly, so as to ascertain the correct result.

- The variety of reports that many other researchers discern during hypnosis sessions are the result of confabulation (Narratives derived from metaphor or imagination) and/or erroneous hypnosis technique

- If the result doesn't conform to the standard scenario, the hypnotic technique must be incorrect

As I described in The Cosmic Bridge, I have found a continuum of descriptions, variations on a theme from the "Standard Model" as described by and Dr. Jacobs and by the late Budd Hopkins. I find a large number of variations on that theme, however. I've found that nearly every experiencer will have a wide variety of encounters in their lives including those matching the standard-model, as well as others that include non-abduction contact and spiritual/metaphysical experiences.

In the hundreds of hypnotic regressions I have conducted, I have not observed the consistency Dr. Jacobs describes. In conversations with him, I have pointed this out. To this, he has replied that I am not looking deep enough, not asking the right questions. I have always been willing to step back and examine the way I do things. Am I not digging deep enough? pushing hard enough? Yet at the same time, I have made every attempt to keep my hypnotic technique careful and non-leading. Perhaps as a result, I have needed to tread more lightly. Perhaps therefore, I have not seen the consistency that Dr. Jacobs has described. Does this imply that his results are more accurate, or is the opposite true?

I must note that I have conducted far fewer sessions with each experiencer than has Dr. Jacobs. Does this mean that he is getting to a deeper core of the phenomenon? Or does it mean that such a long progression of hypnotic work might result in a "normalization" of the narrative toward the "standard scenario". Is this the case? Since I am not close to the work behind The Threat and "Walking Among Us," I couldn't say. But I always view it with discernment when a single hypnotist has many independent clients describing the same scenario.

I have seen other cases where a hypnotist elicits a coherent scenario from a wide range of clients. Clients seem to come away with a viewpoint that at least to some degree seems to align with that of the researcher. Yet I note even where this is the case, researchers involved tend to describe very different (even mutually exclusive) scenarios. In addition, the narrative-consistency they describe is very different from the variety of descriptions experiencers have described to me. So I need to ask - am I asking too few questions? Am I not digging deep enough? Or since every access of human memory effectively alters it, by remaining more neutral (and thus less agressive), am I instead minimizing any possible alteration of experiencers memories?

In addition, the scenario in The Threat, and Walking Among Us does not explain several key issues we have noted in this "standard scenario" of close encounters. Several of these I have described in The Cosmic Bridge.

1) The Air Traffic Control Problem - to sustain the volume of alien abduction activity, an absurdly large volume of UFO traffic must be present. The volume of UFO traffic would have to rival (or exceed) that of commercial air traffic in our skies. 

2)) The Infrastructure Problem - Such a vast amount of alien activity necessitates an extensive alien support effort and organization, roughly on the scale of the allied war effort during World War II. 

3) The Paranormal Fallout Problem - A wide variety of paranormal effects are observed associated with the UFO phenomenon. UFO encounters appear to be just one aspect of a continuum of phenomena, including cryptocritters, balls of light, ghosts and other anomalies, psychic and metaphysical experiences, electrical sensitivity, etc. 

4) The Reality Paradox Problem - A pure nuts and bolts view of UFOs does not seem to account for the apparent non-physical nature of many encounters. Many seem to involve dream entities, spiritual and out-of-body experiences, altered elements of the experiencer's known environment (the Oz factor), and the list goes on.

These limitations suggest that one or more of the assumptions behind the standard scenario are incorrect. We need to again ask, what are the possible explanations for these events? Are they all "nuts and bolts" visitations as Dr. Jacobs maintains? Or are there other, more esoteric explanations - spiritual, multidimensional, temporal, etc. If so, could more than one of them true? Are any of the explanations of the phenomenon mutually exclusive?

I don't know the answers but I am leery of any answer that is too clear, too coherent - and above all, too easy. As I read through the dark descriptions of the alien agenda as portrayed in Secret Life, The Threat, and now in Walking Among Us, I sincerely hope he is wrong.

Glimpses, glimmers and grapes

he sky has been busy in the last month or two. As a result, have seen a number of fascinating new cases take their places in the Minnesota MUFON case files. Several of those cases have brought us some solid glimpses of the strangeness the phenomenon brings to us. It brings a logic all its own, offering a narrative of  unexpected and unexplained interactions with - something. Most of all, we see a hint of physical evidence, a glimmer of potential solid proof that something extraordinary has happened. Like so many times before, that evidence seems so full of promise. Yet like so many times before, a truly solid case remains just beyond our grasp.

The events of recent weeks remind me of the story in Greek mythology of the Grapes of Tantalus (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tantalus). In this classic tale, the gods condemn the hero, Tantalus, to stand in a pool of water he cannot drink, overhung with grapes he cannot eat. The grapes are just within his reach, yet any time he tries to reach for them, they recede just out of his grasp. Just like the grapes, solid evidence for the UFO/CE4 phenomenon at times seems almost within our grasp. We can almost touch it but all too often it slips away.

Several new entries in the Minnesota case files deserve special note. In each case, the phenomenon has had a powerful effect on the experiencer, disrupting lives and threatening their very well being. As usual, I will obfuscate and aggregate the cases so that they are not specifically identifiable or traceable to the existing witness. Yet the descriptions capture the essence, especially the strangeness of the cases. 

The first is a composite of several cases over the course of several years, and captures the essence of at least one recent event. The drama began as the witness experienced a close sighting of a UFO hovering over a nearby park. She watched for several minutes as the craft remained motionless a few hundred feet from her. Then suddenly the craft was gone. At that same moment, she became aware of a gap in her memory, a period of missing time along with a powerful, unexpected feeling of fear.

Severely shaken up, she reported the sighting to MUFON as well as several other agencies. A short time later, things became even more disturbing. Pulling up in front of her home were two classic Men in Black (MIBs). They approached the front of her home, driving a big, highly polished older model car. The interior of the car was hidden behind the darkly tinted windows. 

The car approached where she was standing as the driver rolled down his window. Both men in the car wore dark suits and sunglasses. The driver mentioned the UFO sighting she had just had and referenced the knowledge that she had had missing time. Then he threatened her, telling her that she "didn't see anything." This witness is a very combative woman and told the men she knew what she saw. Nothing he said would hide the truth.

"You shut up or you're in for a world of trouble," was the man's terse reply. "We can make your life miserable." The witness responded with an obscenity and turned away, closing and locking her front door. The car lingered in front of her house for some time and then drove off. Unfortunately, the man was right. Days and weeks of grief began, starting with losing her job and continuing with personal, financial and legal troubles. All had a common theme - invisible, pervasive harassment by some entity or organization with the ability to influence and manipulate things behind the scenes. 

Since this is an aggregation of cases, it is not possible to relate a single outcome. However in most cases, the witness has "clammed up" and no longer would speak with us. Still we are left with a significant case of a well-defined close encounter and a record of official harassment, with possible evidence to support both. This clearly suggests something extraordinary happened and the authorities know it. It tells us how powerful the phenomenon and those behind it can be. Yet the evidence is not sufficient to establish this without a doubt. The grapes still hang beyond our reach.

In another set of cases (also aggregated and heavily obfuscated), an experiencer (we'll call her 'Patty') had undergone several late-night abductions over the previous few weeks. In each case, she awoke the next morning with the sense that something extraordinary and frightening had happened. 

Following one event, she suddenly became very ill. While she generally avoids the conventional medical system, she decided her illness was severe enough that she went into the hospital emergency room. After a thorough check, the doctors were unable to find the cause of her illness. However, they did conduct numerous tests to rule out known causes. When the results came back, they suggested her illness was at the very least, unusual though not immediate cause for concern. The doctors could not explain the exact symptoms of the illness, itself. To this day, the cause and mechanism of the illness remains a mystery.

After several discussions with possible medical investigators and analysts, we concluded that the illness potentially had a non-extraordinary medical origin. Yet the details of the illness had no apparent cause and seemed closely related to her UFO encounter experiences. So what happened? Was this health event the result of a UFO abduction or would some other more prosaic explanation account for these events? Again, we don't know. We can only add the data to our case files and continue on. The grapes are once again beyond our reach.

In case after case, there are subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) indications of the reality behind UFOs and close encounters. We can touch the answer, but oh-so-often we can't quite get our hands around it. 

In yet another set of cases, we find the witness in a public place such as a retail store when a stranger walks in. The stranger has an unusual or awkward bearing, with unusual eyes (or is wearing sunglasses) and seems unfamiliar or uncomfortable with normal everyday activities of life. An example might be a stranger standing behind the experiencer in line at a convenience store, carrying on a conversation, which in retrospect was very unusual. In one such case, the experiencer had just such a conversation, talking with a strange couple in line behind her. The couple seemed to know details of her life, including of her recent UFO encounter. They talked for a short time and then they parted company. She later realized she couldn't recall the stranger's eyes, and during their entire conversation the stranger's lips never moved. 

In another case, a stranger came into a local convenience store to buy a bottle of pop while the experiencer was standing at the counter. The man seemed uncertain of how to purchase it, even how a convenience store worked. He finally came up to the counter where the experiencer was standing. When the experiencer talked with him, the man behaved as if autistic, paranoid or other unusual behavior. Yet the eyes seemed to hold a subjective message that he was closely associated with the phenomenon. That night, the experiencer had another abduction event which appears to be closely related to the stranger.

In each case, there is an interaction with the experiencer, a conversation in line, a purchase at a store or something similar. Then the stranger walks out of the public place, turns a corner and is gone. In more than one case, the experiencer has suddenly remembered something, some final question, etc. They hurry after the stranger, trying to find them once again. But the stranger has vanished - even though there is no apparent place they could have gone, no nearby car, no alleyway, etc. 

On several occasions, security cameras have captured an image of the stranger. Yet in the video, there does not appear to be anything unusual about the person. There is simply that aura of strangeness and the unusual mannerisms they project to those around them. Are they from another place? Are they extraordinary in some way? I don't know. Again, we are presented with a lead into the unexplained. Our fingers again close in on the grapes. And once again they are snatched out of our grasp.

In yet another case, which I refer to as the case of the Flying Fisherman (see The Case of the Flying Fisherman on my website, www.craigrlang.com), an avid fisherman with a GPS device attached to his boat experienced multiple cases of missing time. Each time, the GPS captured unusual traces, along with time resets, and other anomalies. Analysis of the GPS traces showed that during his periods of missing time, he had apparently travelled in his boat on a path which at times took him over land(!). The anomalous paths would begin at the start of his missing time and end at the moment his memory resumed. Unfortunately, the GPS device was intended for fisherman and so did not show altitude. Thus, we don't know if he ascended from the lake or remained at the surface. While the evidence from his GPS device is anomalous and tantalizing, it again lacks the ultimate proof value. The grapes are not quite within our reach. 

Will we ever grab the grapes of Tantalus? Perhaps, or maybe not. But for now, the best we can do is solid field investigation work, measurement, sampling, etc - along with careful documentation, finding glimpses and glimmers of an answer. At the same time, we can try to help the experiencer come to terms with the extraordinary events of the close encounter. And maybe, just maybe, in the process, a grape will fall into our hands.

.

The Many Roads of a 'Plastic Shaman'

Lately, I've been reading a book that does more than any other to drive home the history of the European, Native American conflict. And it doesn't make me feel very comfortable for a zillion reasons, not necessarily the ones you might think.

The book is called "The Wolf at Twilight." It is written by Kent Nerburn, a sculptor and journalist who was a good friend of an old Lakota named Dan. I don't know if Dan had any particular shamanic or medicinal role in the tribe, but the old man was a deep font of Native wisdom. The book is the story of the author's interaction with him over the period of a few weeks during the author's return visit to the reservation.

One powerful point the story drives home is that of the cultural differences between the Lakota and the European cultures. There is a deep, fundamental difference in world views - a vast gulf between the Red and the White Roads. For someone like me who has been raised on the White Road but finds certain elements of the Red Road attractive, it has a sobering message. It says that ultimately, 'you are not us.' It says that 'you can't possibly know what we went through. You look at us through the eyes of a European culture. You say you want to learn our ways - but only a little bit of them. You seek us, but only a little bit of us. You are sympathetic, but only to a point.' And you know what, they are right. Ultimately, we are different people with different histories, traveling different roads.

A number of years ago, Gwyn and I visited Fort Snelling to see the Minnesota Historical Society's re-enactments over the Fourth of July holiday. As we were entering the park, we encountered a group of Native American protesters. They were militantly demanding that Fort Snelling be torn down and that the land be returned to the Lakota. While I am somewhat sympathetic to the Lakota point of view, I was completely put off by the militancy and vitriol with which one particular woman confronted me. I felt my own hackles rise with her shouting at me. I began to feel more aligned with the European settlers in the 1860s, than with the Lakota who were there to convince me of their case. Yet now, reading this conversation in "Wolf at Twilight," I began to understand the background and energy behind that rage.

I hear generations-old arguments about the wrongs committed, and how that injustice is now built in to the fabric of American history. In response, I have always argued, "Yes but I wasn't the one who did it to you." In The Wolf at Twilight, Dan scolds the author with the rebuke - "No, not personally. But now you directly benefit from it. You live far downstream but you still drink the water."

So what is one to do? I am always interested in doing the right thing. I have always been in favor of both justice and mercy. Yet could I ever really understand the world through the eyes of "Dan" or of the Lakota woman confronting me at Fort Snelling? Probably not. That injustice is built into the very fabric of the way I live. Yet when I read the words, I see a little more of the world through the eyes of Dan and I realize I could never hope to see the righting of that wrong.

At the same time, I am very sympathetic to the author as Dan rebukes him for what his grandfathers did. I felt the author's discomfort as I realize that live too live in the white world, and maybe that makes me exactly what some Indigenous peoples refer to as a 'Plastic Shaman.' I am interested in Native ways. But as I look at how to learn more about them, to more deeply study shamanism and earth-centered healing, once again my 'plastic' world returns. I look at schedules and time commitments. And once again I say, "...well, yeah I'd like to study this, but I can't fit it into my calendar right now. Maybe later..."

If I were truly on a Native road wouldn't I be much more flexible? Wouldn't I be willing to roll withe the punches, flow with the eddies in the river - or whatever other metaphor you wish...? Am I really a creature of plastic, or could it be instead that my path is simply different?

A few years ago while on vacation, Gwyn and I by chance met a Hindu medical doctor who lived in an area near where we were staying. In keeping with Brahmin hospitality, he invited us to join his family for the evening. During conversation, he suggested how his path would allow him to feel at home in any house of worship. The thought stuck me in a very heart-warming way. The lesson I took from the evening was the importance  of honor and respect for the traditions of whatever road I am on, to be a thankful guest and a gracious host. There are many roads, and each leads to the Creator. Given the right understanding, discernment and respect, perhaps any road can be the right one - or perhaps all of them at once. For me, it is life on a spiritual bridge.

During a meditation circle I attended a few weeks ago, I was told that I do indeed have a bridging role. In many aspects of life, I often find myself in the role of a bridge between worlds - a mediator and/or peacemaker. I am sometimes a facilitator of contact between elements of consciousness that are very, very far apart. Indeed the word the leader of the circle used translates to 'Spirit Bridge' or 'Cosmic Bridge.'

Meanwhile, I look at how uncomfortable I felt reading the passage in Wolf at Twilight, and I realize that while I can learn a lot from that road, I am NOT indigenous American. My ancestors came from elsewhere and so I am indigenous somewhere. For me, that somewhere is northern Europe. And so part of my research over the last few months has been to learn a little more about my own ancestral (and therefore indigenous) culture. This has led me to stories from the Northern Tradition, the ancestral Nordic ways, Teutonic shamanism, etc., the White Road. There has been so much of the pre-Latin, pre-Roman culture lost (and much of that which was regained was badly corrupted by the evils of the 1930s and 40s). While there is very limited information out there, there is some, and that's where the White Road travels.

There are so many lessons to be learned on the Red Road, the White Road, the various Eastern traditions (the Vedic path), etc. At the same time there are so many other paths: Rationalism, Gnosticism, my own home tradition of the Way of the Cross, and so many more. And one of the biggest things I learn from traveling so many paths at once is how similar they are. Even when they seem so very different they all come from God - and in the end, in some way they all lead back to God.

If I am sometimes a guest on another's road, so be it. Let me simply remember to be a thankful, understanding and respectful guest. If I find my own road, let me bring to it understanding and respect for the other paths. If I am to be a bridge between roads, so be it. Let me better understand the lessons at both ends of the bridge. And as I strive to learn these lessons, perhaps a 'Plastic Shaman' like myself can be at home and of service helping others find their own road to God.

Flags Earth and Stars

Today, I saw an interesting post on Facebook on a new symbolic design that was just published, a new Flag of the Earth (http://www.flagofplanetearth.com). It got me to thinking a lot about what it means to be a citizen - of your locality, your state, your nation - and of your planet.

I am writing this note on Memorial day, 2015. Thirty years ago, today, my wife Gwyn and I met on a rock climbing trip to Devils Lake Wisconsin. It's been three pretty amazing decades. For many of those years, Gwyn has been in the US Naval Reserve. While I have personally never served in the military, I have the utmost respect for those who do/have. I had the wonderful timing of turning 18 just after the Vietnam conflict ended and they ended the draft. I pursued my own career blissfully ignoring that timing. It wasn't until quite a few years later, meeting and later marrying a service person and veteran, that I got to thinking about all of this. What does it mean? What are the costs? What are the consequences?

The point was driven home for me a few years after we married, when her unit got activated for Desert Shield and Desert Storm. Although the war ended before their unit actually left, I could see the preparations and the emotional trials that each serviceperson goes through. Then, a few years later, we were back in Iraq and Afghanistan and today we see this in so many as they prepare to leave for - well, for wherever. While I will leave the politics of the wisdom of any given choice out of this discussion, it did again drive home the reality of what Memorial Day is all about. 

Several years in a row, Gwyn and I travelled to the Black Hills over Memorial Day. I have always found the lighting ceremony at Mount Rushmore a moving event. At the end of the ceremony, they invite the present and veteran members of the armed forces down to the stage to participate in the lowering of the flag and last year, Gwyn participated. It brought tears to my eyes to see her acknowledge the time and effort she put in to the service of our country.

One of the things I have noted each time we have gone to the ceremony, the narration has talked about the responsibilities and rights of citizenship at each level - up through the national level. But they left out what I believe will one day be the most important level - the World.

At the same time, I have often asked myself, "Craig, where did you serve?" and my answer was that I have served that World. The last few years especially, I have found this idea increasingly meaningful. As I have become involved in my own work with MUFON, the idea has become ever more real - humanity is not alone in the Universe. And that not-alone-ness might be just be visiting us now. 

After working as a healer and a researcher for nearly 20 years now, it has become ever more apparent that the boundaries of nations are fading. As the trend from local/tribal allegiances, to small states, to nations continues, we will one day find ourselves as part of one greater entity - Earth. I believe that time is arriving.

I looked up on WikiPedia, some notes on previous attempts to create a Flag of Earth (http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_the_Earth). One that I found most attractive, was the Flag of the Earth, flown by the SETI community. (not sure if they still do). So when I read about the idea of an Earth flag once more, I was really intrigued.

We are now on the threshold of venturing full-force into space. There will be national ventures, international ventures and now private ventures into the cosmos. The first serious, permanent presences will be space stations, the moon and Mars. So the question arises, will we go as Chinese, Americans, Europeans, Russians, etc...?  Or will we go as Humans from Earth?

When I hear astronauts talk, one of their biggest and most immediate, impressions is that you don't see borders. Many describe how they begin to see  the entire world as one delicate system, and everyone and everything that lives within it is part of that system. There are no nations or borders, except in the minds of humans.

Similarly, as I work with many who have experienced contact with what might be visitors from "Out There" (whoever or whatever this phenomenon is), I begin to see even more how the time in which national identities are foremost may finally be passing. Many experiencers describe the same feeling as those of astronauts - that the Earth is fundamentally one, and borders are artificial. Perhaps we need to begin moving toward that unity in our own thoughts - and even in our flags and allegiances.

One day, I suspect this transition will happen. We will have many disagreements, struggles and yes, even wars in the mean time as this change takes place. People will disagree on how that gradual unification will come about (or even whether it should). We may have false starts and setbacks. But in the end, as we venture out into space, and/or meet those who may have come here from elsewhere, I believe we will eventually transform the patriotic pride in a great nation into a new focus - that of being part of a great world with a Flag of Earth.

Beige cars, evening stars and orange butterflies

I have been conducting a little experiment over the last few days. I have been working with the book E-Squared, Nine do-it-yourself experiments to prove thoughts create reality, written by Pamela Grout ( I will just call it E^2 for short). The book has a number of little experiential exercises, experiments in intention in which you place a simple request out to the universe, to God, or to who/whatever you choose to call the Higher Power. The time period is over forty eight hours, and during that time, your job is to notice the response. I am now on experiment #2, and so far the results have been very interesting.

The first experiment in E^2 is to ask God to show you that He's really there (Sorry feminists, I still use the masculine term I grew up with). The experiment is to ask for an unambiguous sign, something clear and undeniable. And what I got back was really interesting.

At the same time as this experiment, including for the last day or so, the weather had been particularly nice - and last night during early evening, the sky was crystal clear. The planet Venus was high in the west and as a result, we had been expecting at least one "night-light" sighting report to come through the MUFON reporting system. Sure enough, the universe obliged - a report came through of a light seen over south Minneapolis. Whatever the result of the subsequent investigation, the lesson here is that I had asked for a nocturnal light sighting report and sure enough - one appeared.

The next thing that happened was the following morning. After I had put out the intention to God to do something I would notice, I found the hood release on my car opened. My car had been in the closed garage all night. I had not pulled the hood release at any time in recent memory. Furthermore, had I driven with the hood release open, I would have darn sure noticed it. So some time during the night, the release under the dashboard of my car apparently had been pulled.Was this some kind of paranormal event? Probably not - I'm sure there's a rational explanation, something I just haven't thought of. However, it was a fascinating little mystery, a little bit of weirdness at just the right time.

The next day, I received a couple of calls for help. One was from an experiencer in another part of the USA who had just had a rather terrifying encounter. I helped her to find the local MUFON chapter, as well as a hypnotherapist in his area. It simply felt great to be able to help someone find the resources she needed to cope with these unexplained influence in her life.

The second was from a person who walked in to my office at The Circle of Healing Arts. The person was under considerable personal stress and for that moment, had nowhere to go and no one to turn to for help. He was not a client, and probably would not become one. Yet here was a man who desperately needed help. And I was fortunate enough to know the right people and have the right information to connect him with the resources he needed. Some times the chips just fall the right way - but to me, this was a (relatively) unambiguous sign that God is present and listening. In this case, I was able to do something positive, specifically by being in the right place at the right time.

More interesting stuff happened over the last week or so (see my other article, Who rang the bell?). A lot of synchronicities, a lot of 11:11's staring me in the face. A good skeptic would say that of course they do - that number occurs on the clock twice per day.  The key is not that it occurred, but that I happened to notice it. Circumstances somehow prompted me to look up and see that number.

While not extraordinary in itself, a number synchronicity is something like seeing a mile marker along the road of life. It has little meaning on its own. Its significance is in its location and the context in which you notice it - telling you where along the highway you are. Similarly, the number synchronicity happened to occur as I was reading a book on paranormal and metaphysical mysteries - including number synchronicities.

The second experiment, which I am just now concluding, involves putting out a request to observe a particular class of object, color, etc. In this case, during the first twenty four hours, the request is to see beige cars. The second twenty four hours, the request is for orange butterflies. Both requests are relatively simple - the universe doesn't have to bend over backwards for you to see a beige car or an orange insect. Again, the intent is for you to notice the event, rather than for the event itself.

In the subsequent twenty four hours, I think I saw at least twenty beige cars. I never knew there were so many beige cars in the world. I compared the number of cars of that color with cars of other colors and found them to be about the same. Again, the key is merely what the eye is attuned to see at that moment. And for me, that was beige cars - the universe is still throwing beige cars at me.

The second half of this experiment is to ask for orange butterflies. So far, I have not seen any, although I notice that on the wall of my office are several native American paintings that include both an orange background and a butterfly pattern. I've noticed lots of other orange objects as well - Post-It notes, a stone made of Carnelian (an orange-ish mineral), even an orange bumper sticker on a beige car. But as yet, no butterflies - it's probably still too early in the season. Still, I wonder, did I accidentally include a comma or an 'and/or' in my request for orange butterflies? God definitely has a sense of humor..

In the next few days, especially if the sky is clear, I expect we will get a few more sighting reports. And in the mean time, I expect I will see a lot more 11:11's, beige cars, evening stars and perhaps even some orange butterflies.

Who rang the bell?

The universe is not only stranger than we imagine, but stranger than we CAN imagine
 - J.B.S. Haldane


Intriguing anomalies are everywhere. If you keep your eyes open, you can notice them every day. Synchronicities, events that seem to defy explanation, dreams that come true - these are a few of the little (or sometimes not so little) events that remind us there is more to reality than we understand.

A few days ago during a meditation circle, we noticed an interesting little mystery. The circle was led by a friend of mine, a psychologist who also teaches meditation, mindfulness, etc. Prior to the start of the circle, she had a background music CD playing. Then, during the meditation itself, she played a guided imagery recording of a lake with a sunset, waves on the shore, etc. - with trance music in the background. She began the meditation by ringing a small pair of finger bells before starting the CD. At that point, she set them down on the table, started the CD and we began the meditation.

After a few minutes the guided imagery was concluded and she turned off the CD. I found the moment to be one of unusually deep meditation, but soon it was time to come back to the physical world. We heard the "ding" of the bell once again as our eyes opened. Everything was great except there was one little mystery - she wasn't holding the bells. They were still sitting on the table, motionless and silent.

Curious, we checked a number of possibilities. The CD player was indeed off. I don't think anyone else had their cell phones on, or had ring tones that sounded like these particular bells (I do have a meditation timer on my cell phone with a chime that sounds somewhat similar, but not identical). Furthermore, the second dinging sound definitely came from the same location as the first. So it remains an open question - where did the bell sound come from? Who rang the bell?

I love these little anomalies - not quite miracles, not quite magic, not quite explainable within our rational understanding of the world. Yet they happen. To me, they suggest that there is simply more to the fabric of reality than we understand.

Some time ago, when I was interviewing an experiencer (I will call her Sarah), she told me the story of when she and a friend/coworker (whom I will call Nancy) were staying in a hotel during a business trip. The hotel was reputed to be haunted and the "extra resident" had a reputation of being protective of female guests. But he was also a bit of a prankster.

While Sarah was in the shower, her roommate stepped out to take care of some errands. A few moments later, as Sarah was stepping out of the shower, she heard movement just outside the bathroom door. She assumed Nancy had returned, and said something through the bathroom door. There was no response. A short time afterward, when she emerged from the bathroom, she found no one else present. For a moment, she assumed Nancy had simply stopped back to pick up something she had forgotten. But then she noticed the door - the chain lock had been set.

A few moments of thought will clarify that this is truly an anomaly. While no one else was present, and Sarah was in the shower, Nancy had left. Yet one cannot lock a chain lock from the outside. It can only be locked from the inside. So - who locked the chain lock?

Other anomalies abound, and I suspect many of us have our own stories. As I interview experiencers and their families, I often ask if they have had any other unusual events in their lives, or their family history. I am often rewarded with accounts of fascinating synchronicities, precognitions, or other anomalies. In The Cosmic Bridge, I talk about some of these reality anomalies and include a story of how "Evelyn," during the return stages of one abduction event, watched the UFO depart from in front of her home. She distinctly recalled the window being open slightly as she watched the object rise out of sight. Yet, when I looked at the window, I found it did not open or close. It was a solid pane of glass.

What do events like these tell us about the reality we live in? Assuming there is not some as-yet-overlooked explanation short of the extraordinary, they suggest our world has aspects to it that somehow defy logical explanation. Who rang the bell in our meditation circle? Was there some reality overlay in which the bell was both rung and not rung? Was there some interaction between the physical and metaphysical world that allowed a dream-like event (or sound) to occur? What allowed a window to be both opened and fixed shut, or a chain lock to be both put into place and not put into place?

In the theories of Carl Jung, there is a continuity between the purely physical and the purely mental world - what he called a psychoidal reality. In quantum physics, when a measurement occurs a choice is made between different possible quantum states. Thus one or another potential path through space-time is chosen while others are not. The paths not chosen are known as the counterfactuals.

In the Many-Worlds interpretation of quantum physics, when a choice is made, the universe actually divides into separate and distinct timelines, one in which the particular choice is made and other worlds we do not perceive in which a different choice occurred. And thus we can ask, could there be some interaction between these worlds? Could some form of meta-reality still be connecting the possible universes? These all suggest deeper, intriguing layers to the fabric of reality.

Little mysteries are one of the truly fun aspects of anomaly research. Beyond dealing with the sometimes-frightening accounts of alien abduction and their attendant post-traumatic effects, I find it both fascinating and pleasant to notice these little anomalies. They stretch and tear at our reality. They prompt us to question our standard (post)Newtonian view of the world and our belief in rational cause and effect. They make us ask whether there is more to our universe than we do (or even can) understand - and they force us to ask ultimate questions like....

"Who rang the bell?"

Resstlessness, Exploration and a nice spring day

It's one of those first nice days in spring, a Friday afternoon in mid March when it feels like the weight of winter is finally lifted from off our backs. The world feels like a freer place. It is a familiar feeling - call it spring fever. I needed to get out of the four walls, some place where I could sit back and relax, while at the same time concentrate on the studying, writing or other creative work I need to do. 

I would sit down at one place, and then I would feel like no, I needed to move to someplace else. At the moment I'm at a Caribou looking for that ideal seat, someplace I can sit down and focus on the writing I need to get done.

What has this got to do with topics like UFOs and close encounters, exploration, science, anything beyond the horizon? Well, it turns out, probably plenty. Restlessness and creativity are what drives us. On days like today, I look up into the deep blue of the sky - cloudless, clear and infinite. I feel the feeling that got me going into this stuff in the first place - what's beyond that blue? And in my own mind, I try to imagine, to reach out to whatever that might be. What is beyond that horizon? What awaits us far beyond the edge of the known?

In this month's CE4 Corner, I ask a lot of questions about where the close encounter phenomenon is headed. In it, I describe reading a lot of material on the possibility of star travel. This includes a new book by Mark Millis and Eric Davis, "The Frontiers of Propulsion Science". It is a compilation of articles edited by two of the foremost thinkers in the quest for star travel. If you begin to read it, I hope you like math, because it has a lot of it. However, it dramatizes to me how we are probably pretty close to star travel now. The engineer in me reawakens at the thought of possibly building something this advanced. It is just beyond the edge of the possible and so, just maybe if we push the envelope a little more, we might just find ourselves on the path out to the cosmos.

At the same time, I just signed up for a class in something I've been interested in for a long time. Totally opposite of the mathematics and computer programming that have occupied much of my time and awareness, it is a workshop on shamanism. Specifically, the class is "Introduction to Shamanism". It seems totally opposite of the engineering I have been pursuing, yet it is motivated by the same thing - curiosity and restlessness. 

I have read a lot of Graham Hancock's work, heard lectures by Scott Wolter and others who are working the edge of the known. Scott Wolter, the producer of the TV series "America Unearthed," has been exploring many aspects of the hidden history North America. Hancock has explored some of our possible shamanic prehistory. I have followed both with wonder.

Each one of them answers the same drive - to reach beyond the horizon, to explore the edge of the known, to see what is beyond the blue of the sky on a nice spring day.

Where is this all going? - draft of this month's article in the CE4 Corner

Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot remain in the cradle forever.
 - Konstantin Tsiolkovsky 


I just got done reading the book, Interstellar, a novel based on the screen play for the move by the same name (Note: as I write this, I have not yet seen the movie). The ideas are interesting. Although, I was not overly impressed with some aspects of the story, I was struck by one aspect - the need to expand beyond Earth in the relatively near future. I also recently read an article on space.com, in which Steven Hawking talks about his view that humanity must expand into space or face extinction. While that journey will likely take us to the planets first, ultimately, I believe that our destiny lies among the stars.

Another classic bit of literature I recently re-read was the story of The Day the Earth Stood Still. The story is a cautionary tale in which an alien named Klattu lands his flying saucer on the White house lawn and warns us.

"...if you threaten to extend your violence, this Earth of yours will be reduced to a burned-out cinder. Your choice is simple: join us and live in peace, or pursue your present course and face obliteration...."

While I doubt that a universe of Gort-robots is lurking out there, threatening to incinerate us, the concern is a valid one in real life. With humanity being in its currently warlike state, would the Cosmic Community, whoever is out there beyond our known world, allow us to travel to the stars? And if we did try to travel beyond the confines of our solar system, what would happen? Would we be greeted by a hostile welcoming committee? Perhaps, in the words of Klattu, "The penalty for provoking their action is too terrible to risk."

And yet, I suspect we are probably within a few hundred years (at most) from developing a working means of star travel. I recently received a copy of the book Frontiers of Propulsion Science, by Mark Millis and Eric Davis, two scientists at the forefront of advanced space travel concepts. The book offers detailed (very mathematical) treatments of possible ideas for star travel. The bottom line, travel to the stars could be feasible in the foreseeable future.

FTL (Faster Than Light) travel is not strictly prohibited by the theory of relativity, as has always been assumed in the physics world. There are ways around the Einstein barrier. The Alcubierre warp drive is one such concept. While a practical implementation of this is nowhere near feasible at the present time, it shows that at least in principle, the mathematics allows it. We can picture a hundred or so years of work by brilliant minds would produce solutions to the "impossibilities" of star travel.

So, if you were the Cosmic Civilization, observing an upstart, warlike race of beings on the verge of developing star travel, what would you do? Would you incinerate this threatening world? What if that upstart species offered something important to the universe? What if destroying them would be an incalculable loss? Perhaps, instead of destruction, you would do something else - somehow intervene to improve that race, force its evolution to the point where it would become acceptable - at least from your (the Cosmic Community's) point of view.

How would that intervention appear to those living on that developing world? Would they see a landing on the White House lawn? What impact would that have on this upstart world? According to the most experts, the effect of open high-level contact would likely be severe. So to avoid disrupting this developing species/civilization, you would probably keep your influence covert. You might allow yourself to be observed only in fleeting moments. To me, this is exactly how the UFO and CE4 phenomenon presents itself. It describes the human-visitor interaction in great detail.

I firmly believe that our human destiny is among the stars. And now, as physics advances, it seems increasingly likely star travel could become feasible far sooner than anyone had thought. World War 2 accelerated our technology in some areas - perhaps by several generations. Rocketry, nuclear technology and other areas of physics are just a few. Progress in all of these areas accelerated during that time period. In some areas, in only about five years we advanced by nearly a century. As a result, we are much closer to routine space flight and the scientific/technological breakthroughs needed for interstellar travel.

In The Cosmic Bridge, I discuss just such a possibility. And from the point of view of the Cosmic Community, this human-improvement project would suddenly take on new urgency. We would expect to see a tremendous acceleration of the UFO/CE4 phenomenon. The timetable is tight - to effect a fundamental change in the state of human civilization within a few hundred years. As a result, the interaction, while still covert, would have to be on a truly massive scale. Indeed, since World War 2, we have seen a tremendous increase in the number of reported UFO encounters. Perhaps this reflects that urgency.

If this picture is a valid model for the close encounter phenomenon, then what should we see in the next generation or so? Should we see some sort of change to the aggregate consciousness of humanity? Should we see a shift away from war? Should we see an advancement of human thought toward more harmonious living - peace within humanity and with the Earth, itself? And if so, what would the initial signs be?

So far, in the last few decades, I have not yet seen signs of a large-scale, fundamental movement away from war and toward harmony. At the time of this writing, several new wars have broken out, filling our evening news with a steady stream of violence and suffering. Political tensions are rising and environmental issues appear to be getting worse, not better. Yet perhaps the "improvement" influence is still below the surface, taking a greater period of time and manifesting in a more subtle way. If so, then perhaps we will not see any overt changes in the near future. Yet, as psychic/spiritual the changes reach a critical mass, I wonder if we will see a rapid shift in the aggregate human behavior, the aggregate world body-politic. Still, I'm not holding my breath.

As I see the effects (both positive and negative) the close encounter phenomenon has on the individual, its propagation down the family line, and the children of experiencer families, I can only conclude that "They" are up to something roughly akin to this "human-improvement" project. (Note: we again need to remember that this is an improvement from their point of view, not necessarily ours.) As I observe this, and at the same time I observe current world events, I can only wonder, will this "improvement" be completed in time? And what will "They" do if we develop interstellar travel and start spilling out into the galaxy before we are fully "improved"?

So, as we reach this critical crossroads, I have to ask the question - what should we expect to see next? And even more fundamentally - where is this all going?

Doing, being and finding your own path

Some time ago I presented a two-hour lecture on hypnosis and hypnotherapy to the Psychology 101 class at a local community college. It was a great class, and I really like the instructor. It was a delightful experience, and it reminded me of how much I love teaching. In another life, I would be a professor. It prompted me to think about all of the people walking around asking themselves, "What do I want to do when I grow up? Who /what do I want to be?"

There are so many possibilities, and so many paths. Some might lead to fulfilling lives. Other paths might work for a while and then it might be necessary to move on. Other paths are much less of a fit, and forcing one's self to stay on that path would lead to increasing degrees of unhappiness in life.

For some, perhaps the solution is to not grow up - simply staying on a default path, avoiding (procrastinating) life decisions altogether. Yet the road leads somewhere. Even if you don't choose to decide, the decision will happen. You will end up somewhere, whether you like it or not. So wouldn't it be better to end up somewhere desirable? What do I want do do? Where do I want the road to go?

Many of my clients over the years have asked this same question - and within them, there was a very good reason why they couldn't answer it at that moment. Each of us has our own crossroads, our own questions. And each of us has to figure out the answers at our own pace. The challenge comes when something within one's self makes then unable or unwilling to seek out the answer. And as a result, some people follow the path of least resistance - or even no path at all.

As a late high school kid, I loved rocketry and electronics - especially amateur radio. It was automatically assumed that I would become an engineer. Yet my interests were more in science than in engineering. I would rather have been studying astronomy, rocketry and physics. Still, I took the path of least resistance - eventually graduating in engineering. Then, upon graduation, I took a job in corporate America - in the defense industry. I quickly realized this path wasn't for me, but it took over twenty years for me to actually do something about it.

This experience makes me very empathetic with clients who describe feeling stuck in that same way. Somehow, the path they are on doesn't feel right. Maybe it's the stress level, or for any other reason, corporate America doesn't fit. Most often, it is simply the realization that the path doesn't fulfill an earlier dream. As time goes on, the dissonance between the job (and perhaps other areas of life) and the dream seems to widen. Eventually, it even becomes hard to get out of bed in the morning to face another day. Something has to change.

For me, it was the deeply ingrained interest in astronomy, space travel, extraterrestrial life and alien contact, as well as consciousness studies and the deep mind. It wasn't until I became involved in MUFON as a field investigator, and then becoming a hypnotherapist, that I began to see that there was a way, a path that would help fulfill my dream of exploring, understanding and advancing human knowledge of science.At least for now, I seem to be on that path.

For many clients, I suggest something along the lines of the New Horizon methodology - descended from the NASA Horizon Mission Methodology developed during the 1990s. It focuses on finding ways to accomplish the "impossible". How do we go beyond the next step, and take the next leap? How do we reach a whole new world beyond our present horizon.

And how do I as a hypnotherapist use this process to help someone break out of their present world?
Picture life a couple of years from now. If you could do anything you wanted, without constraints, what would you do? What would your passion be? What would feel fulfilling to you? And above all, in all honesty, who do you see yourself being? Picture that, and imagine a day in that world. What does it feel like to be that person? Allow it to settle into your consciousness as if it were a solid reality.

Then imagine you are looking back from that future reality, noticing what it took to arrive from the present day. What obstacles were there? What did you have to learn, change or become? What skills did you have to develop? What challenges did you have to overcome?

Perhaps the most important step in traveling down a road is to begin. Returning back form the future, picture the road from the present to that future reality. What was the first step you took down that road? How did you begin? Where did you start? What was that experience like?

After that, additional steps follow, and the important thing is to take the steps one at a time. Planning and road-mapping is vital but each step has to be taken one by one. And before you know it, you have arrived at your first destination - and there is never a single destination. Each destination is really just another step on the road. So picture your later destinations - shorter term goals and longer term goals - miles, yards and inches. At some point, imagine yourself at each of those, and figure out how the road led you to (and through) them.

But the first step is finding that future - what is your passion, your dream? Who do you want to be? And is the present and future worlds congruent with that "Me"?
There may be many answers to these questions - maybe only one - or maybe a path of least resistance. But you will most likely end up doing something. For better or for worse, your path will lead you somewhere. It can be take you where you want to go and who you want to be, or it can lead some place else.

Who do you want do be? Which path would you rather travel?

Letter to Astronomy Magazine in response to their March, 2015 editorial on UFOs

New year notes - What have we accomplished?

Yeeoow - is it 2015 already?

And furthermore, have I really been involved in MUFON for nearly 20 years?

As I look at the history of my involvement with MUFON - mostly with the local UFO scene - I find myself asking two important questions: What has changed in those twenty years? and What have we accomplished in that time? 

What is different now, outside of each of us being about twenty years older? To me, the answer is that a lot of details have changed and yet, fundamentally we have accomplished very little. 

The biggest change seems to be that we now realize just how little we really understand the UFO/CE4 phenomenon. When I became increasingly involved in UFO studies - in about the 1994-1996 time frame - I imagined that simply by acquiring enough data, we could solve the problem. All we had to do was to observe and/or reconstruct flight dynamics of UFO sightings, make physical measurements of ground traces, analyze radar/visual reports, etc. And at the core has been the field investigation of sighting and encounter reports. Twenty years later MUFON is deeply involved in this - and while it has yielded a lot of data, it does not appear to have gotten us much closer to a definitive answer.

Yet while we may be little closer to a solution, I believe we have accomplished a lot in twenty years. Now, we appear to have a better idea of the scope of the problem. I believe we have established without a doubt, the reality of UFOs. Purely by the volume of reports in our database, we have developed a statistical picture of the events that make up sightings and close encounters, a pixel by pixel portrait of the phenomenon. And in all of this, we see that there are no easy answers to the fundamental question - what is going on?

In twenty years, the close encounter phenomenon has moved from being a fringe element within UFO studies to being in some ways at the core of the mystery. What is the nature of the visitor presence and why are they here? I suspect we are still no closer to truly understanding this. But we have begun to see that the answers we thought we would find were merely first steps. The problem is far more complicated than we ever imagined. 

What will a solution to the UFO/CE4 mystery require? Will we be able to understand this phenomenon within the framework of our present-day picture of how the world/universe works? Or will it require a fundamental change to at least some aspect of our world-view? I suspect it will be the latter. Once we understand the problem of UFOs and close encounters, I believe we will have learned much about the very fabric of reality, itself. And what we learn will probably be very different from what we think we know, today.

Understanding the UFO/CE4 mystery will require us to understand parapsychology. How do the visitors communicate by thought alone. Encounter reports also contain myriad ways in which they seem to be able to manipulate our reality. How is it that they can affect our minds and our perception in such strange ways?

In addition, we have come no closer to understanding their location of origin. Do they come from among the stars or are they, in some way, from right here? Is there even a distinct location of origin? Is there really a location they call home? Or is there an over-arching civilization that spans the cosmos, a universe of many homes?

To understand the visitors, we will need to understand their technology. How can they simply walk through walls, float through the air and ascend/descend over beams of light. How can their vehicles stop on a dime, hover, and then zip to a new location, all without experiencing the forces encountered in the Newtonian world? I suspect that the answer to this will shake the foundations of our present-day physics to its core - and to some extent perhaps it already has.

In twenty years, we have acquired a lot more data. We have begun to piece together a picture of our interactions with the UFO/CE4 phenomenon. But have we come any closer to a full understanding of what is really going on? In some ways, perhaps we have made some progress. But fundamentally, I believe we still have a very long way to go.