A brief conversation with Myrtle

The last few days have been powerful in many ways. They have been trying, emotional and interesting. They have taken my life in a way I wouldn't have imagined even a few days before. The driver of all of this is that my father is extremely ill with heart failure. It is likely that he won't be with us too much longer. As such, I cleared my calendar, put my business and many other aspects of my life on the shelf to join my family, spending time sitting with him in the hospital and nursing home.

This afternoon, I spent quite a bit of time doing just that. But for each of us, hunger calls. So I asked one of the nursing assistants on that floor of the care home where I could find a cafeteria. To my surprise, she not only told me but showed me exactly where it was as she walked with me across the entire rather lengthy senior care complex. Eventually we came to what I expected to be a cafeteria. In actuality it was a sit-down restaurant.

This was late in the afternoon, well between meal times so there were few to no other people in the restaurant. The attendant at the restaurant ushered me to a table and took my order, then headed for the kitchen. A few seconds later another of the staff came out with my coke as I waited. \

While waiting, I was chatting on-line with a couple of friends. It was a change of pace from - well, from sitting there holding my dad's hand. As I was typing a text message on facebook messenger, my thoughts were suddenly interrupted with a question. On the other side of the divider separating the restaurant from the lobby/hallway, a woman's voice asked me, "Is it dinner time already?"

I looked around to see a pleasant looking lady, quite senior, but less so than most of those I had seen here. I asked her what she meant, to which she replied that she wondered if I was there for the dinner hour (mercifully, I don't think she thought I was a resident). I explained that I had just stopped there for a late lunch (it was nearly 3PM). She asked me if I was one of the staff, and I explained that I was visiting my father who was in the recuperative care area of the facility. 

I saw a name tag attached to a rather fine necklace. Her name was Myrtle. Myrtle was probably in her mid 80s. She was well dressed, and was clearly eager to let people know she was still conversational, and was quite ready to talk with anyone she could. She stood comfortably on the other side of the divider and seemed to get around without assistance. She did not have a cane or walker.

She explained that she lived in the independent living apartments attached to the facility. She was from South Dakota but had come here because her family now all lived here. I introduced myself and told her I was from Minneapolis, but that I had grown up in Madison. She also told me she had traveled quite a bit and now she and her husband lived in a place where they no longer needed to keep up their house. Now they could just travel as they pleased, which seemed to be quite a bit.

A short time later, a man I assume to be her husband appeared through the doorway opposite the restaurant. He also looked healthy, and was about her same age. She waved and I said thank you for introducing herself to me. She turned and walked away.

Meeting Myrtle was one of those brief moments that make you think. Her world is so different from mine. Her life is still one of adventure - or at least one of travel. While she lives in a senior care facility, she did not appear to be of declining health herself. Yet she seemed to need someone new with whom she could carry on a conversation, however brief.

Was she lonely? Was she simply a friendly soul? How much else was there to her story? What she told me in our brief conversation was that she was quite well traveled. I wonder how many adventures she held in her memory. I suspect we had merely scratched the surface of her life story. I would bet that she had seen a lot in the years of her life.Were they positive? How much other-than-positive had she experienced? In the little time we had talked, I had gotten the impression that there was far more to this lady. And as she walked away, I wondered how many other seniors in the care home had stories to tell that were just as varied. What a treasure of life experiences must lay in the myriad of beds throughout this - and many other - facilities.

I think of efforts like the "Greatest Generation Project" trying to document as much as possible of the life stories of the generation that fought World War II. I think of the many families that may or may not have captured that history before Grandpa and Grandma passed on. And I think of the stories my dad told my brother and I when Gwyn and I visited Madison at Christmas time. He told me more of how he met my mom. He talked about his experiences during the war (he worked on the home front as a draftsman at a company making rocket fins). What a different life they lived. How different their perspective was from what we know today. There were a zillion unasked questions, all arising in my mind too late to take their place in our conversation.

As this woman walked away, I returned to my on-line chat. Our conversation receded into my memory, not awakening until a few hours later when the ideas for this article began to take shape. A million questions, a zillion imagined scenarios. And they were all sparked by that one moment - that brief conversation with Myrtle.
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Goals, questions and organic realities

Last night, when I attended the Holistic Chamber of MN, I had an interesting experience.

The person speaking was talking about setting goals, where do you want your business to go in 2016. That is quite an exercise for me at the moment, as I'm at somewhat of a crossroads. But even more interesting than that was a comment by one of the people at my table. She indicated that she felt goal setting such as we were doing in this exercise was actually limiting. As we talked, she made some rather interesting points.

The core of her argument was that most of the goal setting exercises are top down. They are traditional general-to-specific stepwise refinements of an overall concept. My friend's comments was that this is quite linear, rationalistic, cause-and-effect, present-to-future reasoning. In her view, instead of expanding your vision, this exercise actually limited it. Rather than coming from the subconscious, these goals come from the rational mind.

My friend observed that that goals set in these top-down exercises don't typically last very long. Furthermore, the Universe has a way of throwing curveballs at us. Call them karma, life lessons, or anything else, but the world is an unpredictable place. Setting goals top down can be less flexible than might be needed in our topsy-turvy life and times.

I have found that this top-level vision tends to be the sticking point with many people I know. In fact many people don't know what they want - at least in the rational mind. There are also influences from family, the boss, last year's business plan, etc. So the top down vision tends to be very skewed by what you 'should' want, instead of what you truly want at your innermost core.

Instead, perhaps we need to envision a future from the bottom up. What if instead, we can grow that future organically, and feel that reality. Then perhaps that future will take its place as a future reality. Perhaps then it will more closely match what our passion is.

In hypnosis, I've done this with a number of clients. Inviting them to be a one or two years into their future, I have asked them to describe their surroundings. Starting with the most primitive, I have asked them questions like are you inside or outside? Are you alone or is there someone with you? Is the location bright, or is it more dark? Are you standing, sitting or lying down. The key here is to establish a deep emotional association to that future reality. Then we can build from there.

Once we have that basic reality established we can begin to look at some more sophisticated  questions. What does your office look like? How often are you in it? What is your relationship with other people, both in and out of the office? 

Then we can ask What is happening now? Just as if we were doing hypnotic regression, I ask the client to continue, allowing the clock to move forward. What is occurring? What is the feeling behind whatever is going on now? (hint, it should be enjoyment or passion for what is occurring, otherwise we are not in that ideal future reality).

Once we have established the details of this future reality, we can ask what the most important aspects of this reality are. What is it about this future place/time is the most wonderful? When do you feel that passion? What helps you feel the most reward? What is it about this reality that is most important?

Once we know that, we can ask what the changes were that helped bring that reality about. What was the road you traveled from the present day into that future reality? What did you have to do to travel that road. What were some of the challenges you had to overcome to reach that reality? And finally, what was the first step you took from the present day to get you down that road? 

This is where I typically team up with a life or business coach. It is important to revisit this vision, and this road on a regular basis. And in that, perhaps the road less traveled can become the road that leads to a future, passionate reality, one grown bottom-up from the fabric of consciousness, rather than prescribed from the top down. 

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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.

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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.

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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.

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