Reclaiming Authenticity, July 29, 2022
Reclaiming Authenticity with Dr James Houck
Title: Long Time, No See: The Universal, Multiple, and Spontaneous Nature of After Death Communication
Reclaiming Authenticity
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Reclaiming Authenticity: The courage to reclaim that which has always been in you.
No matter who we are, where we were born, and into what family we were placed, ours is a world full of relationships. Indeed, we are social beings who spend our lives making sense of our world by trying to find our place in the world. As social beings, it is often within the context of relationships that we experience tremendous pain and suffering. From overt acts of betrayal and cruelty that someone may have inflicted against us or vice versa, to simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time, many people bear the scars of physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual wounds. And yet ironically, just as we experience our woundedness in relationships, it is also within the context of healthy relationships that we find our healing and authenticity. The difficulty, then, is often finding the courage to discover that which has always been in you.
For over 25 years, Dr. James Houck has been helping people discover their authentic selves by integrating spirituality into their mental and emotional health. As people are able to integrate these disciplines, they often discover core issues that have been keeping them wounded in relationships.
dr. James house
well hello hello everybody good afternoon three straight up according to my clock welcome to reclaiming authenticity this is the show which really focuses on reclaim that which has always been in you and the search for your authentic voice your authentic self very excited to be with you here every Friday at 3 p.m. Eastern Standard Time noon Pacific Standard time and just been you know the busy this summer and I'm sure that you all have been busy too and and here we are at the end of July and Monday will be right in August or August 1st so you this year is just flying by and in case you haven't started your Christmas shopping or whatever it's like you better get on it so you don't fall behind but just when we think we have enough time to get everything done not true or turning the calendar
it's just speeding up soap anyway that's something that when I was growing up you know the all the old-timers men and women all the old-timers it's a boy don't be such a hurry to grow up take your time cuz when you get older time just seems to fly by just kind of look at them weird like place you don't know what you're talkin about go do something else stop bothering me leave me alone let me just do my thing I have enough time for that and before you know it you'll blink and your much much much much older and you start to realize the wisdom and know what those older Generations were telling you at the time so we have to make the most of our time because we realize that not only is it going by quickly but the things that we used to take for granted have not always been the case so again even in when it comes to the death of a loved one or saying goodbye to
I love going to ponder that we realized we'd always want more time and if only we could have done this or if only we should have done that and so forth so but you know that is the wisdom of the you know for the ages you know just to listen to those Elders who have these incredible stories and lived experiences and what they have to share and just the wisdom and that's something that I think the Youth of today it is really missing out on you know I was just listening to those Elders go to the grandparents or even the great grandparents and not just ones who you know talk about the good old days but ones who just have a lot of as I said lived wisdom because they've been on this Earth longer than most of us and they've made their mistakes they've they've done their trial and error they've lived countless Joyce and celebrations and they've also lived countless tears and so forth
so that is right in line with our topic today they are we going to be talking about after-death communication and it's actually the universal multiple and spontaneous nature of these after death Communications and in a little bit I'll be sharing about exactly what is after-death communication and why is it important for us to have these experiences ourself if we are fortunate enough to have them and and I'll also be sharing why not everybody has these experiences but also to listen to the stories and and ultimately how they helped us that you know there's a psychological there is an emotional there's a physical even a spiritual benefit to the after-death communication you know it does have an effect on us because it helps us appreciate where we are in the Here and Now
well my name is dr. James hauke and if you would like more information about me or if you want to leave me a bunch of comments about Today show I invite you to visit the website www. DDS radio.com reclaiming authenticity that is all one word and if you would like to be part of the show I invite you to call in its 888-627-6008 that's 888-627-6008 and I certainly want to be taking your calls today after the break of course about the halfway mark cuz I really want to hear from you if you've ever been contacted by a loved one after they have passed okay and so if you find it that is true if you've had an after-death communication experience invite you to call in and share your story with us and
it's always good to hear from people and you know hopefully you know help you to make sense of it and so forth so anyway before we get to that I always make it a point just to share with the with say perhaps new listeners cuz there's people tuning in new all the time that you know just exactly what is reclaiming authenticity as well as where did that come from in me you know it actually comes from two deep-seated beliefs in it myself and the first one is that I am a firm believer that all of us come into this world already equipped and then gifted with everything we need in this life in terms of other skills or those strengths for those character traits or skills are giftedness unfortunately as long as you know as we go along in life and then he's due to some unpleasant experiences
Prince's we may feel like we need to hide those very unique aspects of ourselves you know the special parts of ourselves the best parts of ourselves because we might want to push those down to the others people can see it but they cannot see it because perhaps maybe when we are a lot younger or giftedness started to come out and for people who were jealous or didn't know what to do with that you might have been made fun of or ridiculed in some manner or told that there is really nothing special to you anyway and because that hurt our feelings we stuffed the very best parts of ourselves down and we went through life then and in relationships from a place of wounded disc a place of pain but place of frustration and that's how we interacted with relationships in our lives we couldn't we didn't feel like we we could be ourselves you know our authentic selves
there is so much more to us than what we have become even so far and this is what reclaiming authenticity is really all about it's it's Having the courage to reclaim that which has always been in you who are you deep down inside out your core you know what does your authentic voice sound like what does your authentic self look like and so forth and these broadcasts really focus on the integration of your Having the courage to reclaim that which has always been in you how that comes out with the integration of spirituality and mental help health all within the context of our relationships relationship that we have and where you're looking at ourselves in the mirror and our Reflections looking back at us the relationships that we have with others and even our relationship with
Define the universe so it is my great pleasure to be with you here today so as I start off every broadcast with this question how is your work today I hope that wherever you are today you are safe and you are at peace as I was half of communication
yeah it's this starting off with you no have you ever been contacted by a loved one after they have passed this could be in a number of different ways sometimes our loved ones your contact us through dreams sometimes they would contact us through Visions or sometimes they would contact us when we heard their voice and we can swear it was them standing right beside us or what if we smelled their perfume or cologne and nobody else was around us and we immediately knew they were close by
I know there's also technology you know sometimes the loved ones would you know contact us through a phone or or so forth and so these are the moments which occur every day but they are still none the less very impactful in our lot so I would have to begin this broadcast just by sharing with you about how I became involved with after-death communication and earlier in my career as a mental health practitioner and a Pasco professional I became involved with bereavement counseling I mean that's where I started and the mental health counseling I actually began with the HIV aids community and there's also a whole host of folks struggling and I donate with bereavement but they also were hiv-positive and they were grieving multiple bats
how do I live my life with this disease and how do I be in relationships with others and so on and so forth and so helping people through their loss and grief H2 issues really seem to come naturally to me because you know I like rough experiencing many losses in my life in fact today I have to admit that when I am either attending a funeral or officiating at 1 this is really where I feel most at home now I know that might sound bizarre you know but right now you're listening to a guy who when he was a kid I used to run around graveyards on Halloween with his friends you know when whenever Linus and Sally are out looking for the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown and so forth I was playing tag with my friends in the local cemetery and fact the best times when we were playing tag was when there was a full moon on
Halloween. Really lit up the cemetery so you didn't trip and fall and you know that's your head open on Auto-Tune stone or or you know tracker or something as it gets closer to Halloween I'm going to have to share that but that's definitely for another show but it seems like I became well acquainted with with death and loss and bereavement it really wasn't something that was like off-limits to me but this was something that I imagine with most people was a mystery what is this all about is there something or what happens to us when we die and so forth you know he's very Innocent but legitimate questions and so that they said working with others it just helping them understand their loss is actually how I got involved with after-death communication and actually near-death experiences as well as well now anyway
all I'm saying is that death and dying it was is nothing new to me and yet what was due to me at the time way back when was the way people share their stories of their loved ones showing up
not so much about the details of their loved ones coming to them and dreams or visions but rather I noticed how these appearances shall we say make them feel as they talked I always quit since a wave of Peace a sense of insurance that came over them like they never had before and they had some pretty incredible stories we we still have pretty incredible stories you know to this day about people sharing after-death communication experiences but you know it's not just that people report like all year one night I was just minding my own business and their my grandmother wants
weather in my father was over there my mother lives or something like that yeah these these stories are always told in a very peaceful manner not matter-of-factly but in a way in which they do their loved one was all right and safe and Howe
and like I mentioned I had been involved with bereavement counseling early in my mental health work and as people had shared their stories of loss and grief they also shared a x how loved ones had shown up in their dreams or a vision that they had of their loved ones and they would often say things like well okay now I want to share something with you that I don't know if it's real or what but you tell me later and they would say my grandmother showed up the other night in my dreams and told me that I was going to be okay
or there were times when they would say I was out walking last week and I smelled my mother's perfume and I could swear she was walking right beside me or there is even times when you know people would be minds her own business and they would just have a very brief the quickest quick just a vision of their love and then they were gone but they knew who they were looking at this overwhelming sense of peace that they had
and even though and then I have to admit I get a sense that my my own father-in-law is showing up in our kitchen in a kitchen and dining room area which when I think about it this was the place that he enjoyed hanging out with his family I don't get a vision by I don't get the dreams but every now and then I just sense his presence
now I have to say from the outset that I don't know how after death Communications work I mean I don't know if our loved ones go up in Tapped Out on the shoulder and say God is it okay that I just pop down for a little bit you know just just 5 minutes I promise I promise just 5 minutes I promise I will be right back I won't be long okay I'll write good thanks
I don't know how that works I just know that people from all walks of life different cultures different languages different experiences have these after-death communication experiences
but any rate whenever a loved one passes I believe there is there's a really unnatural urging us to the want to stay connected to them and it was something that was interesting that I discovered in earlier bereavement studies that the advice was back then was for us to get over our losses as quickly as possible and I'll get rid of or donate our loved ones possessions or clothing move on with your life and start connecting with other people
a lot of people took that advice and the constant problems later and my problem with that advice is this
that it really didn't help people grief it only taught us how to stuff our down our feelings and our relationships and we just stuff them down which only made matters worse when it came to working through our Grace because it totally ignored the fact that we will always be connected to our loved ones
and that's true we will always be connected with them as we're reminded of let's say their birthdays or weddings or funerals or holidays or Vacations or any other time that we're does monitor on business and they come to mind
and again I believe these times are very normal very healthy for us even if the memories we have are not so great or very painful and whenever this occurs should remind us that grief is a process
saying goodbye is a process and it's going to take time
but you know
one of the first things that needs to be cleared up for many people who don't quite understand that you know after death munication or even not quite sure about or they even flat out fear is beginning with what after death medication is not okay so after that communication is not us trying to make contact with our loved ones or going to the place of their death and calling out hello hello are you there
an after-death communication is also not about us breaking out a Ouija board and contacting our loved ones to get a message about the next big purchase or asking them you know asking them for help and making a decision about whether or not at the right time for us to get married and an after-death communication is not about attending a seance or to make contact with the other side to see if Heaven Is For Real
but instead what after-death communication is is that our loved ones reach out to us as I said I don't know how it works but it stopped
and these after death Communications you know they aren't Universe in that you do they occur for anybody regardless of differences in culture or language they're also spontaneous and that they are random and they can occur at any time whether we are awake or asleep you know but most of the time after this communication occurs when we are simply like I said minding our own business and I also discovered that after death Communications are multiple because most of the time the people receive more than one such as they you know their loved ones you contact them through a dream and a vision or a dream and they would hear the voice of a loved one and so far it was something that I really started to Discovery my own research with after-death communication than just listening to
people talk about their experiences and the more heard these stories the more I just became convinced that there is something here these experiences are occurring for Reese so what kind of effect they have on us and so on and so forth and a while back at me and years and years ago I presented a paper on this about the universal multiple and spontaneous characteristics of after-death communication at the international near-death experience conference down in Virginia Beach
and I spoke about how people experience loved ones who would show up and dreams and we all dream of our loved ones but when a loved one shows up in our dreams this is different this is real we know it we might wake up and we just feel as though it just was unlike anything that we've ever experienced before and people also had Visions visions that would only last for a few seconds and then their loved one was gone but again people
I would swear that they recognize who was there
and then they would hear their loved ones calling their name or maybe some would sense their loved one's presence even through the same non-indigenous animals that show up at random okay that is and I were an animal typically doesn't live nowhere or an animal that was a favorite of your loved one and I'll share this with you my my wife's godmother she loved Cardinals and you know that was just a bird and brighter the better the redder the better you know Cardinals and we see in the summer time but we made me see them during the winter time because they can they can hang with the cold temperature so to speak and a lot of people love to see the Cardinals and other birds that hang around during the winter well after my wife's godmother had passed we started to see
a lot of Cardinals and you do more than just the usual more than just one or two and then they just started to show up everywhere and my wife would always just smile and she would see you do all these Cardinals and she would always be reminded of her godmother and she just kind of waved at them and you know just I see I see the Cardinals thank you you know just the thing for godmother for still looking in on her and you know worried about her or if you want me to take care of her or whatever she was thinking at the time but that's also very very common and some other people that I had you know just the honor of listening to and they would share stories of other animals like wolves or foxes that would show up or you know my favorite flower that would just start to bloom out of the middle of nowhere that was just a favorite flower of the loved one and eight
I think that I have experienced we have lived in one place and we didn't plant this flower but it just started the bloom all of a sudden after her death and that was the tiger lily a very beautiful flower is orange and has black Speckles and everything but a Tiger Lily and not just one Tiger Lily but multiple Tiger Lily and so that would always remind me of my mother and so whenever I would see tiger lilies and to this day I'm reminded of her and the lessons I learned from her and the relationship that we had in the different ways in which she modeled her face for me and how she struggled with her faith than how she overcurrent came in and just so on and so on so on so it's just very special to me so animals yes you know and then certain plants would just start the bloom other people shared with me that that's sometimes a peacock or a deer
or snake or a cougar would would show up and they would just they would see the animal like the peacock and just okay I immediately thinking of my loved one that it's not just always nice but it's a very powerful thought you know when to just immediately that loved ones presents is there and then there are some people who would hear their loved ones Voice through a phone or when their phone would ring once they pick up and nobody was there
it would just happen let's say at the same time every day at the same hour in which they had passed and then you know the person just like oh yeah okay that I got a sense of who was calling me so to speak as I said earlier some people would send some of one's presence through smelling their cologne or perfume in fact this is how I sensed my own father's you know my presents checking in for me from time to time back in the day perhaps you men out there remember Hai karate cologne it was discontinued I think way way way way back in 1987 and my dad died in 1986
and I tried a clown had this really cheesy advertisement where you know you showed me I'd splashing it on and then he would have to fight off all the ladies with karate chops and everything else like I said it was very very cheesy but it was funny and every now and then I smell Hai karate cologne what I'm out and about and nobody else is around and smile always comes to my face and I just thanks Dad thanks for checking it
just reminded of that and it's very comforting
and I don't know you know people do receive more than one after-death communication you know in fact the people I talk to you often you know they experienced as many as 23 or even for throughout their lives and as I listen to people share their stories about a loved one I really became interested and how these experiences affected the person in terms of working through their loss and grief you know did these encounters help them really make sense of their loss
what you do Behind These experiences with a larger purpose to them
these experiences help people of Faith experiences help people without faith was this the evidence that needed to prove that there is a heaven
or perhaps these after-death communication experiences perhaps this was a way for the lucky one to have closure that they need it
or did the person experiencing the after-death communication need that extra reassurance that their loved one was okay and healed but they were forgive that hole
and if this is the case then why doesn't everybody who experiences the loss of a loved one receive these at one time or another
because after all for guardless of when a loved one dies no one is really fully ready to say goodbye I mean even if for one of our loved ones is struggling with a slow resiv illness and we see their impending death we're not going to be ready
the finality of witnessing then taking their last breath brings their death Rites of the Forefront of our hearts and our minds
and those incidents as we like to think that we've had a chance to say everything we ever wanted to say to that person and vice versa but how often do we at some point later struggle with some aspect of our relationship with them
but this is normal remember grief is a process this is normal and not just to think while my gosh I thought I already dealt with this know whenever we have these feelings of there's still more work to do that's not necessarily a bad thing cuz it just helps us come to terms with their passing and how do we go on living our lives without that person
and you know there are also times when the death of a loved one comes without warning you know when we don't have time to say goodbye and we feel as though we don't have any closure and in this sense a loved one reaching out to us through after-death communication that can be the means by which we find forgiveness or we find peace and we find assurance that everything will be okay
if you have to learn that after that communication can be experienced at any time because it doesn't depend on us but rather it depends on what is needed at the time
well as I said at the beginning of the show I'd really love to hear your heart on this matter so if you've ever had an after-death communication experience and you would like to call in I would love to hear your story so after the break I'll be taking those calls and the number if you would like to call in is 888-627-6008 that's 888-627-6008 and I'll be taking your calls after the break again you are listening to reclaiming authenticity and I'm your host dr. James hauke be back with you and one minute
okay welcome back I am dr. James how can you are listening to reclaiming authenticity I just want to share a quick word with you about next week she'll that's next Friday I believe it is August the one of my where am I where am I is it August 5th I think it is 3 p.m. Eastern Standard Time in Pacific Standard Time and about after death communication this is certainly a subject which has garnered a lot of interest and curiosity and a lot of people and I'll be sharing some more resources then if people want to follow up with their own reading and so forth in fact you can just Google after-death communication and you'll find a lot of information out there on after-death communication and even if you want to record your experiences there is an after-death communication research
dacian website and I think it's just a dcrf I believe it's. Org so that's the after-death communication Research Foundation website and you can go on there and it's like it was just a whole host of research that has been done Publications and there's even Avenues which you can record or type in or upload your own story to be added to the archives or when you are completely free to listen and read other people's after-death communication and how it benefited them and so forth so as I said I'll talk to you more about after-death communication, part 2 next Friday and I'm going to focus a little bit more on the psychological emotional and spiritual benefits of after-death communication okay because I'm convinced that it's it's
talk about these issues but if we don't ever ask a question okay we've had these experiences how does this make my life better how does this enhance my faith how does this Give Peace of Mind how does this keep me emotionally neutral and so forth we're not pulled in many many different direction it does have very positive outcomes in our lives and it's also very healthy to talk about it cuz I said at the beginning of the show cultures from all over the world share these experiences and there's many many cultures that are just yeah this is this is what we do this is what happens it's really not the phenomenon that's that's taking over at people as it would like say here in the United States and you know we're not a lot of people are talking about this but
a lot of survivors in eastern Nations that near East in the Far East nations in the Middle East are quite familiar with staying connected with their loved ones and you know they are their beliefs are simply grounded in the fact that their loved ones will always be with them and I was just very this very strong connected to their faith and being part of the Community of Faith as well so to the next week for the psychological emotional and spiritual benefits of after-death communication so before the break I was talking about that you know just what is not after-death communication and what is after-death communication and without going through what it is not again I'd rather focus on exactly what is after-death communication and
how much it is our loved ones reach out to us and get all these times are you know Universal spontaneous end and multiple universe so in that they can occur you do for anyone children teenagers adults of all ages and so forth regardless of differences in culture or language these after-death communication experiences are also spontaneous in that you know they're random they can occur at any time whether we are awake weather were asleep and most of the time after-death communication occurs when we are just simply minding our own business in other words were not paying attention and all the sudden there it is and I'm also discovered just in my own life and they're talking with but hundreds and hundreds of people regarding this these experiences that the after-death communication and you know they're certainly multiple because
the time people receive more than one you know in the car could be different combinations later on there the kids are going to start off with a dream or dreams or then it would get a vision or they would have a dream where they hear the voice of their loved one or whatever it might be so it's not the name combination at spaced out parts of the person's life okay and then whatever a loved one dies there is just a natural part of ourselves just want to stay connected with them that we want to be connected to our loved ones and I also shared that an earlier bereavement studies there was this price longest time this advice for us to hurry up and get over the loss of a loved one quickly as possible and what you need to do is go through their things and donate them or to get rid of their clothing get rid of their possessions move on with your life and clean slate and just keep going
and I really backfired because a lot of people who were quick to try to hurry up and get over the death of a loved one actually ran into problems and not just physically with ulcers and so forth but you know psychologically and emotionally even spiritually and I really didn't help people grief it did just rush the process that cannot be rushed you know in fact a lot of people just you know I'm getting rid of possessions of loved ones and so forth. Just hurry up and like as if it never happened you know it just talk people to stuff those feelings that they had in the end those relationships down which only made matters worse because it wouldn't came to working through their grief it would totally ignore the fact that we're always going to be connected to our loved ones and there is a wonderful book out there as research by Dennis
class k l a s s and he wrote the book continuing the bonds and he really challenged this notion of well when a loved one dies just hurry up and get through it get rid of all the possessions and then that's it. Like I said this book does challenge that and he starts off by just saying we're always connected to our loved ones and it's very healthy to hang on to a knick knack or something special a piece of furniture or something that was unique that belong to the loved one as a way of maintaining the contact or continuing the bonds with the person so could be a piece of jewelry I could be a watch it could be a special fishing tackle it could be a sewing machine could be a nice thing that when we look at the object or we hold the object it reminds us of our loved ones
and the relationship that we had with them
again the lessons that they taught us maybe not So Much by what they said but really how they live their life and that's a key you know part 2 or are you know coming to terms with resolving our losses is just maybe not so much remembering how our loved ones died but rather how did they live
how did they struggle
where did they triumphed where did they smile what jokes they told how they were with us whether times in which they were very gentle and we saw a side to them that they didn't show everybody else or they were there times when I really lost their temper and become angry
and if we not may not be able to remember everything in fact our memories email might be a combination of pleasant and not so pleasant there might be some memories that are are quite painful and then there could be memories and which are just very touching very near and dear to our hearts so this is your own that book continuing the bonds dance class just wants us to we can stay connected to our loved ones through inanimate objects because after all we are connected with them
and this audience has heard me share the story before that whenever I cut my finger and then my teacher wanted me to look at the the blood trickling down my finger and and really taught me about the generations that came before me and you don't because they're all there in a single drop of blood as well as understanding that within that same drop of blood there will be many many many many who come after me and so we have that blood soul connection with our loved ones but then again Dennis class was one that's like it's okay though you know not to get rid of everything but hang on to those special things
how many years ago I met kendoka doctor kendoka and actually done research in the you did research in the area of hospice and is very extensive to say and as we sat in his office at the College of New Rochelle in the Bronx we talked about the importance of rebuilding our faith and philosophical assumptions that have been challenged or Shattered by a loss of a loved one and our grief and you know what what really impressed me about this conversation this afternoon I spent with him was how he explained how most of us live our lives according to our assumptions and how our grief causes us to reexamine our core beliefs about how life ought to operate
and after death communication really causes us to rethink a lot about the finality of death
cuz whenever we experience the pain of losing a loved one to death or you know our unchallenged assumptions about life or the fairness in the world even the goodness of God off muddies the waters in the process of mourning
unconsciously we may wonder why are we not allowed to live happily ever after with our spouses or question what is it that we've done that God is punishing us and yet the truth is that death and dying they're certainly the parts of life and living
and hopefully the awareness of our mortality and and ultimately who we are awakens us to become better not bitter persons of faith
hopefully realizing that yeah one day our our hearts are going to stop the brain waves are going to see some things like that knowing that about ourselves and our loved ones how then should we be living our lives today
should we wake up just thinking I have more time and I'll take care of that years from now I'm in good health what could go wrong or maybe we could just ask that question
if I die today
I want I want to spend my last hours or really knowing if a loved one is going to die today what would I want that what to say to them or how would I want them to be remembered and so forth
you're really kind of puts into perspective just when you know we realize our limitations that should wake us up to wanting to invest in more of a quality-of-life to take the time to
forgive to forgive what's been done to us or to ask forgiveness what we have done to another and to really express our gratitude for that loved one being in our life or even the small ways in which a spouse or partner girlfriend boyfriend does things that really touch us just to point that out overstating the obvious and just you know when you ever you said that or whatever you did this and such that that really touched me and I just I just got to say thank you that was very special and you may not that I'm aware of it but I'm glad I was able to see it
and so forth and so you know I'm certainly taking the time out to say how much we love our loved ones you know and other words take nothing for granted you know but cherish every moment we have in this life to cherish every hug every kiss every time we get to hold her hand I get to hold ours and so on and so forth and and really cherish the love ones in our lives because we are connected to that we will always be connected to them and and although we have been accustomed to just the routines and which we Define our daily existence
we're never going to see ourselves or others are the world the same as we once did because when a loved one dies were pulled into a task of trying to make sense out of new circumstances in light of the way things used to be
but you know if if you think about it once we are able to comprehend that death is real and that someday we too shall die despite how difficult that may be for us our whole world huge changes the changes from a naive in a sense of life and pleasure and being cared for to a realization that we must confront our own sickness aging and death and that doesn't mean that we now have to give up that innocence of life where we have to give up Pleasures or we have to give up you know whatever makes us happy or something it's it's not a morbid understanding it's a realization of just how fragile yet precious life is
why not one of my favorite books again if I share with this audience is the ancient story of a spiritual journey of an Indian man they called Syd Arthur Who Lived during the time of the Buddha and Buddhism vs. belief that you know nothing is ever fixed in permanent in this life everything and everyone is subject to change or as the Buddha taught it's discontinuous be coming and we often refer to this as impermanence and if you have ever sat beside a river or a creek and watched its flow you get the idea. Cuz if you watch you know the water runs from one point to Another Round Rock's and maybe Fallen branches or finding the path of least resistance and at the same time the river is not one continuous unified flow the river of this moment is not going to be the same as the river of the next moment
and this is actually where you know the saying from the ancient philosopher heraclitus says you cannot step into the same river twice for other waters are ever-flowing onto you
then the same philosophy you know we can certainly applies to our lives none of us remain the same throughout our years we may think that we're not changing but you know we are the various stages of Our Lives from childhood to adulthood to old age or not the same in any given time and the child is not the same when he or she grows up and becomes a young adult or when he or she grows out early and while it's true that we live from moment to moment we tend to forget that each moment leads to the next and so therefore impermanence and change are just undeniable truth of our existence
do you know another aspect of after-death communication that helps us is with disenfranchised grief something I called the double the double bind and what most people who mourn the loss of a loved one are free to experience normal grief reactions whatever normal is others whose loved ones you do carry a social stigma they're not necessarily given the right or the role or the capacity to grieve as others May and you add to this you know these mourners are in are given either little or no social or religious support to help facilitate their grief and again this was something that kendoka pointed out to me that afternoon you know and that he just says luck when it comes to disenfranchised grief it's it it really comes from the reaction of society
got the rises from one or more of the following factors that you know Society you know doesn't recognize the relationship to the deceased you know whether you were divorced or perhaps it was a partner that you had loved and then that live with her so far or whatever it might be and I said you know the second factor is the losses and recognized or may be viewed by society as significant such as the loss of a pet
are creating a e Nadeau.
I have the third the Survivor is perceived by Society is not having the capacity to more such as children or the elderly well we don't want to take them to the funeral because we don't think it's appropriate I don't think they would understand
what you want to know how many children or I should say adults who have shared with me that has children they were kept away from funerals but they knew exactly what was going on but it came down to more the fact that the adults in their lives their parents and so forth we're afraid that the children would ask some questions that they didn't know the answers to or the elderly I like when I was she probably wouldn't realize where she is anyway or you know there's nothing they can do about it you know that it's just you know why do I burn them but yet it's it's very presumptuous on many people's you know just think that they know what's best for you know their children without asking them for going through an explaining we can get people who could explain it to the the children or you know just take into consideration that you know the elderly that they too need to grieve
and there's also a certain types of death you know suicide and age-related still which may be too embarrassing or produced the heightened anxiety and members of society and again surviving loved one is just not giving that capacity to more and openly let's say from somebody who's mourning the death of a loved one through cancer and so forth okay so again after death Communications stories are worth sharing because of the emotional psychological and spiritual Freedom it produces in people in fact you know you should you do Netflix or Amazon Prime just go down through scroll or Oregon Google you know we have several movies that have been produced actually giving people permission to share their experiences openly with others and we have some great movies out there that just openly talk about death and dying or they may not
after-death communication but those themes show up in movies and just here's a few the Field of Dreams
The Ghost and mrs. Muir
Five People You Meet in Heaven
the ever-popular A Christmas Carol The Sixth Sense
ghost
The Lovely Bones
dragonfly perhaps a Christmas favorite It's a Wonderful Life
even though they're not saying all this is after-death communication this team is seen in these movies
so again if you've had a after-death communication experience share that with somebody who is willing to listen and when a loved one shows up either through when you sense their presence through a cologne or perfume or if you receive a vision or if they show up quite vividly in your dreams or however they might be manifested just make note of how you feel just make note of what was your relationship with them and are these experiences you know what can you take away how does it enhance your grief and and working through that whole process of still being connected with your loved one and so forth
well I'm dr. James how can you been listening to reclaiming authenticity thanks for spending this hour with me and advise you to tune in Next Friday 3 p.m. Eastern Standard Time noon Pacific Standard time we're going to continue this conversation on after-death communication and we're going to certainly look at the psychological the emotional and spiritual benefits of after-death communication but until this time everybody be safe behave yourselves and we'll talk again next week take care
buy a book by dr. it's all there, and we'll see you next Friday at noon Pacific on CBS Radio TV