Your Psychic Powers and Immortality

By John Alan Appleman

Your Psychic Powers and Immortality is A Factual, Realistic Account Based on Investigation And Analysis Of The Often Misunderstood Manifestations Of Man’s Psychic Senses, including:

• The Subconscious;
• Psi Powers;
• Bodily Ailments;
• Telepathy;
• Clairvoyance;
• Psychometry;
• Telekinesis;
• Precognition;
• Nonhuman Communications.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Frederick Fell Publishers, Inc.
• Release date: Sep 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9780883917862

Book preview

Bibliography

I

NATURE OF THE PROBLEM

You are a tremendous machine. Nothing that the well-intentioned Dr. Frankenstein dreamed up can compare with you. Your muscles, circulatory system, nervous and hormonal patterns are more intricate than seem possible under any evolutionary system. Yet all of this is primitive compared to your latent powers. Your mind can reach to the ends of the earth, interlocking with the thoughts of others and picking up images a thousand miles away. Even without effort, through rapport and empathy, you create in others either a warmth toward you or a subsurface hostility. Some of you can see through closed boxes and discern the objects they contain. All of these abilities are known to scientists as psi powers. In this book, we will study these powers, separate fact from fiction, and find out—as. nearly as we can—what makes you tick. And, if possible, we want to help you awaken those powers sleeping in most of us so that they become as available as the ability to pick up a bottle of Coke.

Almost all of mankind is concerned with three problems. The first, and probably principal one of these concerns, may perhaps be expressed as what am I?—and, particularly, am I immortal; or does this existence end all contact of me, as a person, with the continuing wave of life? Probably second upon the list of universal concerns is that of war and peace; third is that of personal and national financial security.

To be sure, there are many other problems—such as that of the sexual drive, the search for recognition, the simple urge of hunger. It is well for all men to be concerned with those problems which are universal in scope; only in this way can their mutual gropings interlock in a solution. Understanding, in all events, must precede solutions of any problem.

This book deals, in part, with the first of these problems. Man is a complex organism, far more intricate than any computer ever built by scientists and possessing capacities which cannot be built into machines. To even make any enlightened guesses which might help to answer our questions, we must understand the anatomy of those portions of man which control any mental and psychic powers he possesses and the way in which they work. We must understand the part played by any evolutionary pattern in order to grasp what powers man possesses and what powers he has lost in this very process. And we must explore, with patience, those unique potentials which are generally referred to as psi powers—emerging, we hope, with some conclusions that may help to answer these questions.

It is, of course, impossible for any one individual personally to know or to experience each area of information covered in a work such as this. Nor would this be expected in any other aspect of research or knowledge. But when we come to any field beyond the reach of the normal—such as telepathy, precognition, or clairvoyance—automatically a look of skepticism crosses the faces of each of us.

An enlightened skepticism helps to make for constructive scientific research. After all, if I have personally experienced something under conditions where I could not have been deluded, then I know that thing to be true. But if you tell me that you saw Uncle Harry’s ghost run the hundred-yard dash in the Olympics, don’t blame me if I back hurriedly out the door. Even if you tell me something which sounds reasonable, I must, before accepting it, know something of your accuracy as an observer and your credibility as a reporter of facts.

My work, for decades, has been that of a trial lawyer. Such a task entails searching for the truth and scrutinizing every asserted fact from each possible angle to see its soft spots—the possible angles of attack or, on the other hand, its corroboration. We cannot accept as true an assertion of a witness without checking his statement against all physical facts and against the statements of others in a position to know those same facts.

On the other hand, we are not so presumptuous as to disregard all evidence not personally witnessed by ourselves. If that were necessary, courts and juries would cease to function. Obviously, the trial judge, the jurors, and the trial attorneys were elsewhere than at the scene of a collision in controversy. They must listen to testimony and judge what portions of the testimony of which witnesses in fact represent the truth.

So it is with us here. You and I are not going to slice into a living brain to determine the function of each area. We can pool the information available from specialists working in brain surgery as well as clinicians skilled in the healing of brain-damaged persons. Hypnosis we also now accept as factual—although in the days of Mesmer, it would have been most unscientific to take that view.

When we come to an analysis of paranormal matters—by which term we mean simply those things not of everyday experience, such as psi powers or psychic occurrences—then we must apply critical standards in evaluating the testimony of the witness involved. The extent of education of the person relating the experience may be, but is not always, helpful. Is he skilled in the separation of fact from fancy as a scientist or as a trial lawyer or judge would be? Does he have a motivation for deception—such as a desire for publicity or personal gain? And the extent of corroboration, or the occurrence of precisely similar experiences to a group of equally credible persons, may also be of benefit to one seeking to separate out granules of chaff.

As an example, if Norman Vincent Peale or George Washington Carver had reported precisely similar experiences, we would say instantly that these are (or were, in the case of Professor Carver) honorable and learned men. Bishop Sheen could persuade any of us of the accuracy of his observations. Should we then discount as inaccurate statements by St. Joseph or St. Teresa, both of whom have been canonized as saints, simply because we did not know them as living persons, whereas we have seen Bishop Sheen on television?

In any of the areas of our search, it seems important to evaluate all information which is reasonably accessible. Thus, I have retained those experiences personal to me because these I can vouch for. Experiments conducted under circumstances where the subjects did not know what to anticipate are included, as are matters of established medical proof. Those reports by reputable persons skilled in the arts of observation, whether assembled in our generation or earlier, have been utilized. A vast amount of nutty stuff has been winnowed out—where the reporters have shifted from fantasy to conjecture to speculation. Some in-between material has been retained, with appropriate comments upon apparent authenticity or lack of it. Let us discuss these psi powers as they demonstrate themselves in action; then, in the final chapter, we can discuss that which is known of a scientific character regarding the mind and the brain.

II

THE SUBCONSCIOUS

Some few years ago, before I had started exploring medical literature to see what functions it ascribed to various parts of the brain, I was talking to a doctor whose principal interest lay in working with braindamaged persons and also in the field of hypnosis. Some comment had been made by him concerning the subconscious.

I don’t know what the subconscious is, I told him, but I know where it is.

Where is it located? he asked.

It’s in the back of the brain and down inside, I said. I don’t mean just a tiny bit at the back. It feels like it takes up more room than all the rest put together.

Just how do you know that? he asked.

Well, whenever I have to soak up a lot of material quickly, like a bunch of documents produced by the other side on a case, I just concentrate on that area and blot ’em up. You can actually feel the subconscious working. You’re very aware of a sensation of activity in that area, almost as if your scalp were moving or your hair standing slightly on end. It’s screwy to describe, but that’s it!

Later that afternoon this doctor called me much excited.

I did it, I did it, he said.

Congratulations, I replied. Now what are you going to do with it?

And this is one of the important questions any person must ask himself. Even more than answering the question of what the subconscious is or where it is located is the question of what use is to be made of it —and what conceivable harm or damage can result from an overly active subconscious mind.

An instance of possible use to be made of the subconscious arose some years ago when I had to go to Mexico on a business trip. I had never studied Spanish. My daughter had an album of Spanish lesson records, a total of twenty sides. Knowing there was no time to learn even polite phrases in the short time available, each evening for five nights I put on four record sides, first relaxing completely and evoking my subconscious to blot up the phrases and words. I did not evolve as a result of those five evenings as an accomplished linguist, but most of the vocabulary remained on tap and no difficulty was experienced in dealing even with non-English-speaking people.

A similar use has been important to me in the trial of lawsuits. There is little time for notetaking; it is more important to be aware of the atmosphere of a trial. If the subconscious is actively aware of the testimony of witnesses, then even without notes one can quote back to a witness, or to the jury in argument, an important admission days after the event.

Similarly, a trial lawyer must read thousands of pages of new decisions each year and file the relevant points in the proper compartments of his memory. Likewise, since so much of his work is concerned with traumatic medicine (injuries caused by violence, such as broken bones and torn ligaments), he must read a number of medical texts and periodicals each year and assimilate that information in such a manner that it is at his fingertips in cross-examining a physician. There is no time then to run back to a library for further research.

An intellectual process may be involved in grasping and understanding technical data in the first instance, but fundamentally all that we are doing is storing new items of information in this highly complex computer that constitutes the mind. This is done through the subconscious.

Let us go on and discuss some other aspects of what the subconscious does and can do, in relation to the human organism, before we try to rationalize as to what it is and how it works. For this purpose, we will eliminate the function of the subconscious as it relates to external contacts, since this is covered in separate chapters.

The human body has three primary nerve networks. They are the motor nerves, which govern movement, great or small; the sensory nerves, which transmit sensation, such as pain, taste, smell; the autonomic nerves, which govern most remaining functions —the heart beat, breathing, and perspiration being illustrations. Now every one of these is a useful function; yet each of them may be controlled by the subconscious. This can be demonstrated easily under hypnosis.

Many persons have the idea that hypnosis involves going to sleep or at least entering a trancelike state. It is true that persons ordinarily cannot correlate their various powers without complete relaxation secured in some such manner or, perhaps, by relaxation under general anesthesia.

Most times, however, hypnosis (and I dislike the word) involves simply the use of subconscious powers to store new information or to recall memories, to check upon the condition of the body, or to aid or to impair the operation of one or more of the nerve networks.

Experiments by Dr. Wilder Penfield and his colleagues at Montreal, and by Dr. Harvey Cushing and others of an earlier generation, have shown that the insertion of an electrode in a particular area of the brain will recall to the patient in full visual and auditory detail an experience of forty years earlier—the words and music of a song, perhaps. Even without such stimulation, a patient under hypnosis may be made to relive experiences long forgotten, apparently regressing back to ages for which there were no memories under ordinary circumstances. These memories are stored in the archives of the subconscious.

The subconscious may control muscular movement. Let us take an illustration. Read this paragraph, then place the book down. Relax completely. Close your eyes. Feel my eyelids are heavy, so heavy, so heavy. Then say I cannot open them—and, if you genuinely so believe, then your eyelids will remain closed until you say Now I can open them, at which time they will suddenly fly open.

The same thing can be done with any muscular portion of the body. The old stage hypnotist, alas, has disappeared with the departure of vaudeville. But the way he picked his subjects from the audience was generally by the following means. He would explain that persons could not be hypnotized without their cooperation.

Now all of you hold your right arms directly above your heads.

Some persons would be embarrassed to raise their arms; most, however, would comply.

Now some of you can concentrate hard enough to say, with complete belief, ‘I cannot lower my arm.’ If you can concentrate that strongly, you will not be able to lower your arm. Now try it.

And from these arms remaining upright, his assistants would make a mental note of those to help in the stage experiments. Then the performer would say softly, Now you may lower your arms.

Thereupon, the arms would come down and he would prepare for the stage demonstrations. You can do exactly the same, by force of the subconscious, through the process of what is known as autohypnosis, or self-hypnosis.

The sensation of pain is a useful bodily function. If we did not have it, there would be no warning if a child’s hand rested upon a hot stove creating injuries sufficient to destroy the usefulness of that hand. Similarly, if we did not know when an insect lodged in an eye, infection of the eye might develop with a resulting loss of sight. Lepers have lost parts of fingers from rat bite because they had no pain to warn them.

But pain can be a nuisance also, where it serves no useful function. Certainly the pain of cancer, once the individual is informed of his condition, is not constructive, nor is the pressure of tension headaches. The so-called natural birth classes work simply upon the principle of training the expectant mother to utilize the natural rhythm necessary to expel the child but to eliminate the unneeded tension and accompanying pain.¹

I attended one of a number of classes conducted for surgeons by a profesional hypnotist, David Elman. One of his early illustrations of pain elimination was as follows. He held up a swab stick and a glass of water. Then he said:

Now this is just a plain swab stick and a glass of water. You and I know that. However, since your subconscious prefers pleasant sensations, if I make a suggestion to you which is contrary to your knowledge, you will accept it. Now, take note.

With that, he moved forward to the first row so that he could speak directly to one of those physicians. Then he spoke directly, calmly, confidently to him:

Now the boys in the drug houses have been coming up with some pretty effective medications. This happens to be a local anesthetic. I’ll just dip this swab stick into this anesthetic and rub it on the back of your hand. That spot has become numb, as you’ll notice. Now I prick it with a needle (which he did) and you can’t feel it.

Now here was a complete and effective demonstration of the reception of an idea which the intellectual mind knew was untrue. In order for the subconscious mind to lock around an idea, the thought or idea must be something not contrary to its norms or standards, it must be something which is desirable or pleasant to accept, the idea (if advanced by a third person) must be presented by one who is confident that such idea will be accepted and acted upon because of such confidence radiating from his demeanor, the suggestion must be couched in words the subject