my article

Alexander Imich in middle age  Alexander Imich (1903-2014) described witnessing seances with diverse manifestations of unexplained phenomena in Poland during the 1930s.  The medium is known as 'Matylda S.'  Imich is the editor of Incredible Tales of the Paranormal: Documented Accounts of Poltergeist, Levitations, Phantoms, and Other Phenomena (1995).  The book includes articles about the mediums known as Mirabelli and Franek Kluski by Guy Lyon Playfair and Dr. Roman Bugaj, respectively.  Imich contributed the chapter "Matylda."  Some biographical information about Imich is presented in the book: Dr. Alexander Imich is a chemical consultant, a contributing editor to Psychological Abstracts , to  Parapsychology Abstracts International , and in the past to Chemical Abstracts .  His articles were published in British, French, German, Italian, Indian, and USA periodicals.  Imich describes adventurous personal experiences with a little-known...

A friend recently wrote to me saying: When you say to experience “I” in total isolation, I try to ignore thoughts, and other perceptions. But the “ignoring act” seems to involve some sort of force. Otherwise its duration will be so short, the thoughts are pounding at the door quite soon. The somewhat forceful rejection of thoughts maybe is the wrong way to do it? To ignore thoughts sounds like a soft and tender way, but I feel it to be a bit harsh. I do not see any other way though. This article is adapted from the reply I wrote to him. Trying to attend to ourself alone is the only effective way to ignore all thoughts We should try to be self-attentive just now, not for a prolonged duration We can be self-attentive only in this precise present moment Deliberately trying to ignore thoughts would be a self-defeating endeavour Thinking can be destroyed only by self-attentiveness The only way in which we can investigate ourself is by trying to be self-attentive 1. Trying to attend to ourse...

This week's "lucky" winner... bacon fried Oreos!! Read more »

A friend recently asked me several questions about meditation and self-investigation, such as what difference there is between them, so this article is adapted (and the third and fourth sections are considerably expanded) from the reply that I wrote to him. Meditation on ourself is self-investigation ( ātma-vicāra ) We should not meditate on anything other than ourself Meditation on the idea ‘I am brahman ’ is not ātma-vicāra Meditation on ‘I am’ alone is ātma-vicāra Our ego is just ourself (‘I am’) seemingly mixed and confused with adjuncts We seem to be this ego only when we are experiencing anything other than ourself 1. Meditation on ourself is self-investigation ( ātma-vicāra ) The first question my friend asked was whether it would be correct to say that meditation and self-enquiry are ‘two different approaches or techniques’, because ‘in meditation you concentrate your attention on one single thought or image’ whereas in ‘in self-enquiry you investigate the ego’, in reply to whi...

 In 1864 a biography of two prominent brothers involved with public displays of unexplained phenomena was published in London: A Biography of The Brothers Davenport by T. L. Nichols, M.D.  The book was subtitled: "with some account of the physical and psychical phenomena which have occurred in their presence, in America and Europe."  The book also chronicles the reactions of people confronted with displays of unexplained phenomena beyond their previous common life experiences.  The father worked in the police department and Nichols learned that "in the families of both father and mother had been observed many of those events which are considered supernatural by some persons . . . and which are both common and inexplicable."   Thus Mrs. Davenport, while a girl, heard, or imagined she heard, one day, a voice directing her to observe the time as marked upon a clock standing near her, which proved to be the moment of her mother's death at a distance....