MONOLOGUE WRITTEN BY CLYDE LEWIS
Whenever we decide to run a rerun show, I have a lot of fans that worry about me. I am humbled and quite appreciative of concerns when this happens. I rarely take time off and when I do, it is usually for a good reason. I am a workaholic undefined my staff will back me up on that.
The reason I took time off is that for the first time in my life, I had to go to the eye doctor for a procedure. I have gone to an ophthalmologist for glasses and a fitting but I have never experienced a moment where doctor had to work on my eye.
Last Sunday while I was at the store, I saw a flash and a shimmer out of my left eye. I write it off as a possible migraine event but then something really strange happened. I saw what appeared to be a black bat like figure in my left eye. It looked like a moth or a dark angel.
I thought I was hallucinating but no, it was there undefined and it changed shape. It looked like a black oily blob and I blinked several times and then pulled my eye lid down because I realized I had a floater. When I closed my eye, I could still see this strange phenomenon and held back my urge to panic.
It change shape again and then it was if it burst apart sending tiny black dots all over my left eye. I realized that this thing was inside my eye and I was then a bit scared, because of the experience.
I worried that I had either popped a blood vessel or something else.
However, the experience of seeing something that was not there but inside my head, I was questioning my reality.
I saw something dark and foreboding in my eye -something that looked like it was there to attack me undefined it was black and gooey and I thought of the irony since I just spoke with Ryan Gable about the Black Goo and what it represents.
So, of course, I called the doctor undefined they were concerned that I had a retinal tear and wanted me to take off work to run some tests.
I must say that while nothing hurt, there was a moment where I identified with a Near Death Experience I had when I had 5 pulmonary embolisms that nearly killed me.
The doctors were using eye drops to numb my eye -so they could put a blue laser light against my eye in order to look in. They also dilated my eyes and then I was given a depth perception test where I looked through a viewer and saw what appeared to be a long path with a picket fence leading up to a small cottage.
It was like those old view masters we used to look through when we were kids.
I then backed away from the viewer and the image of the cottage and the picket fence was hovering in the air in front of me undefined it was weird, and then just like that the image disappeared undefined it was like a lucid dream where it was right there and then poof it was gone..
The doctor then used an unbelievably bright light to examine my eye undefined it was just like the experience of seeing the light when you die and combined with the experience of seeing the shadows of my tiny veins in the eye and the image of that cottage undefined I was curious as to what was happening to me and why it triggered these memories.
The diagnosis was old age undefined when you get older the healthy jelly in your eye starts to break down and when it does you can see shimmers and sometimes floaters. It was nothing serious undefined but they wanted me to come back so that they can do more tests.
This experience believe it or not has given me a reason to question my reality and how I perceive things through my eyes.
I love spooky things and I also love good science – I’m not trying to ruin one with the other.
You have heard of the phrase seeing is believing or I will believe it when I see it undefined well, I saw a dark figure in my eye undefined it looked like it was right in front of me.
Perception is defined as the way in which something is understood and interpreted. Every one of us has a different understanding, knowledge, and experience of the world, and therefore each one of us will have a slightly different sense of perception.
Simple things, such as not wearing your glasses, or looking at something too quickly, can impact our perception of what we are seeing – like thinking a bag under a table is a sleeping dog or seeing Jesus in a tortilla or Donald Trump in the clouds.
This is known as pareidolia, seeing random patterns as familiar objects.
I love spooky things and I also love good science – I’m not trying to ruin one with the other but I am fascinated about what happened to me undefined and the coincidence of the black goo and the triggers of my near death experience.
So, I want to do an experiment with you.
Take out your phone, open the camera, and watch the screen as you pan around the room. The image blurs as the camera moves. Our eyes do not move like a video camera, in smooth sweeps. Instead, they move in short, sharp movements.
Our vision functions much like an old-style cartoon – a series of still images that, when flicked through quickly, give the appearance of smooth movement. The eye is like a camera rapidly capturing still images, which are run together by the brain to create the appearance of smooth movement. This is why our vision doesn’t blur as our eyes move, the way it blurred for the video camera. The eye is sending these photographs to the brain, where they are being processed for object recognition and new information.
The brain loves new information, which is why we are prone to staring at things we find interesting or unusual – we are information gathering. If, however, the photographs are the same old photographs you see every day such as on your daily commute the brain mostly ignores what is in them. This is one of the reasons it can feel like being on autopilot while on your way to work, or taking a route that you have taken a thousand times before.
This is the day to day banality of what we call reality.
Reality is a lot like pornography in that people tend to know it when they see it. Is the chair you’re sitting on or the floor you’re standing on real? Intuitively, we think “yes.” If it weren’t real, we assume, we’d fall down.
But every single one of us knows that there are situations where what seems real isn’t. And as our technology improves, we know that seeing isn’t good enough. I’ve seen Pokémon in the real world via augmented reality.
And if you think about the lessons you learned in grade school, it becomes even more apparent that we don’t necessarily have a very strong grasp on what it means for something to be “real.”
One of the most basic principles of science is that all matter is made up of atoms and molecules. We know this because we can use microscopes to observe atomic structures.
Think about a banana. You grab it , peel it, and eat it. The banana exists. But what if you took a banana and separated each of its molecules out and laid them in a line?
You wouldn’t have a really long banana that stretched out in a straight line, you’d have a bunch of molecules that, theoretically, could possibly be repurposed for something other than a banana.
What if we separated all the molecules in every single object in the universe and then put them in a bag? If we shook up that bag and then dumped it out, there’s no reason to imagine the molecules would all form into their original objects again.
After all, oxygen and hydrogen are perfectly useful on their own as gasses we use for one process or another. And in the right combinations they make water.
There are many post modern scientists and philosophers that are challenging what we call reality. Quantum physics is the way we explain spooky actions at a distance.
I assume that what Einstein meant was that there are a lot of things in heaven and earth that cannot be explained and so perception is what we assume to be reality undefined if you see it and your brain registers it as a rea experience - the you know what you saw be it a demon, ghost or alien -and believe it or not you canundefinedt just write it off as a hallucination or psychotic break.
Things can punch a hole in reality and appear in front of you. These things can interact with you and in some cases terrify you.
Existence is its own measure of proof. But reality, as we think we experience it, may be entirely subjective.
We too can be reduced to cells, atoms, and molecules. And those molecules can be reduced to 6 protons, 6 neutrons, and 6 electrons.
From there you can be further reduced to quarks and leptons and muons and so on and so forth.
The important thing to keep in mind is that we haven’t hit bedrock when it comes to the quantum realm. We are as capable of seeing how deep the quantum rabbit hole goes as we are of observing how big the universe gets.
Theoretically, if we could zoom in past the muons and leptons and keep going deeper and deeper, we could reach a point where all objects in the universe are indistinguishable from each other because, at the quantum level, everything that exists is just a sea of nearly-identical subparticulate entities.
This version of reality would render the concepts of “space” and “time” pointless. Time would only exist as a construct by which we give meaning to our own observations. And those observations would merely be the classical side-effects of existing in a quantum universe.
So, in the grand scheme of things, it’s possible that our reality is little more than a fleeting, purposeless arrangement of molecules. Everything that encompasses our entire universe may be nothing more than a brief hallucination caused by a quantum vibration.
This could explain a lot of things undefined like why we see ghosts, why shadow people appear in your room, why we see UFOundefineds and why some people come close to dying and see the other sideundefined the possibilities are endless and they are no more relegated to tin foil hat explanations.
When our senses get used to a consistent sensation, it’s called neural adaptation.
For example when you put on your socks you can feel your them on your skin when you first put them on, but as the day goes on, you stop noticing them- neurologically you tune out that sensation undefined that does not mean you donundefinedt have socks on undefined it just means that you have adapted and the brain is busily gathering information about other things.
When it comes to stimulation, the brain is greedy. The brain is constantly being fed a stream of information from the sensory organs (eyes, ears, skin, nose, mouth etc.), which it is assessing, cross-referencing, filing and re-filing. Much of this is done without us noticing, and your conscious mind only receives portions of information that your brain deems immediately necessary. Think of a ticking clock that goes silent after a few minutes. The clock hasn’t stopped ticking, your brain has just decided that you don’t need to know about that right now.
Our brain routinely takes for granted that certain things are real -but then something happens that shocks the system. Something out of the ordinary that the brain reacts to.
Sensors go into overload and the brain has to interpret what is happening and it is doing so at a very rapid pace. It signals fight or flight and then after it can put together what is happening it adapts again.
This is why I have always said that many paranormal events that happen are not noticed usually because the brain is distracted undefined but then there comes a time when the brain registers an anomaly undefined and this is where we find ourselves having a break with reality and we have a paranormal experience.
The experience is very real to you and to others that experience it too.
It is as if our reality is a hall of mirrors and every one in a while something shadowy appears and we have no idea how to explain it.
Every kid has grown up hearing folklores of ghosts and how certain places are their shelter to hide. Numerous movies and series have shown predominantly teenagers gathered in an unlikely place to prepare for a ritual of summoning a spirit. The climax gets as scary as it can when a lady lashes out of thin air with a hideous face, leaving everyone tormented or, worse, dead.
Still, what is there to worry about a made-up scene that is depicted on-screen, right? Or maybe not.
Every story about a Ouija board session that has gone bad or an encounter with Bloody Mary has convinced many kids and even adults that you donundefinedt mess with these unseen powers,
In a group of kids in school or with friends at a sleep-over, everyone plays around the game of courage at least once in their life. From sharing ghost stories to even the slightest encounter with a demonic spirit, the masses like to intensify the atmosphere in the name of fun.
Many children have been known to play spiritual contact games using a mirror – one in particular is called Bloody Mary Bloody Mary.
During the ritual, Bloody Mary allegedly appears to individuals or groups who ritualistically invoke her name, usually by repeatedly chanting her name in a mirror placed in a room that is usually lit by a candle. The Bloody Mary apparition allegedly appears as a corpse, a witch or ghost; can be friendly or evil; and is sometimes “seen” covered in blood. The lore surrounding the ritual if she is summoned properly states that participants may endure the apparition screaming at them, cursing them, strangling them, stealing their soul, drinking their blood, or scratching their eyes out.
I would say the majority of people have all had experiences like this that have us questioning our reality.
There is some science behind this and it is known as the Troxler Effect.
The Troxler Fffect is a great example of how our brain picks and chooses what information is important, and also how our brain influences our perception.
Some use it as a way to debunk paranormal experiences but if you are perceiving these experiences the brain registers that they are real undefinedeven if they are calling them hallucinations.
In response to lack of stimuli, the brain can notice other things. Things that get in and decide to take the stage undefined this is your brain on the Troxler Effect. It is where you reality is perceived a hall of mirrors and in the smoke comes various characters from your nightmares.
Either you see them in the corner of your eye or they come at you head on.
This is not a psychotic break undefined this is the eye and the brain seizing on something that has been there all along undefined but you just havenundefinedt noticed. This is why we are frightened of these experiences because they do not fit with the reality we have adapted to.
This is known as a psychomanteum experience.
These darker and unbalanced energies we experience come from places, thought forms, possessions, human parasites, ghosts, poltergeists, demonic contact and even bad dreams or dreams that are seen as apocalyptic and troubling.
Even though skeptics will tell you that these are products of an overactive imagination of superstition undefined the paranormal happens even though we are told that it is not supposed to.
We are told that there are no real monsters lurking in the bushes but there are.
Troxler may indicate that they are imaginary undefined but it is light and shadow that creates a matrix to reveal the demons that lurk among us- the lurkers are very real and haunt us at times.
Whether we like it or not, our homes have what are called Lurkers or inactive spirits that activate in times where we are the most distressed. They are passive spirits but usually appear at night. They have been called many things Cacodemons, Incubi and Succubae — Wraiths and Lurkers or guardians of the threshold.
These Lurkers are actually unleashed during a plague or in a circumstance where death is a constant worry. They move from house to house to attach themselves to articles of clothing, furniture, and animals.
Many people say that these beings wake you at around 3 in the morning which many people know is the witching hour.
In folklore, the witching hour or devil’s hour is a time of night associated with supernatural events. Witches, demons and ghosts are thought to appear and to be at their most powerful. Black magic is thought to be most effective at this time. In the Western Christian tradition, the hour between 3 and 4 a.m. was considered a period of peak supernatural activity, due to the absence of prayers in these wee hours of the morning.
It is believed that it is during the witching hour when a portal opens between the visible and the invisible world. So, someone wakes up feeling like somebody has roused them, or is watching them. This is also the time when out-of-body experiences or astral projections usually happen.
Some people have more of these experiences than others do. The question is why?
Carl Jung has said that the world is not only populated by upright-walking human beings and animals. It is populated and under the control of various thought-forms. There is within those thoughts a great deal of resonant noise and if you listen carefully to the noise there is always something that finds a way to surface, manifest and renders consequence.
That is why as Carl Jung had warned, we must strive to avoid those “shadow archetypes” that creep into our collective unconscious. They undermine everything we set out to accomplish. How we see ourselves is how we see the world and if the collective unconscious is sending you a warning you must pay attention and be vigilant.
When a shadow archetype manifests it confronts us with the truth about ourselves. It also challenges what we call reality.
One day, our species may have to reckon with the ultimate truth that we exist in a reality that doesn’t.
