Book: Contact The Other Side Seven Methods For Afterlife Communication by Konstantinos
This could have been "Afterlife Communication for Everyone". It presents detailed descriptions of different ways of talking to people who have died. Four of these seven methods are based on the concept of electronic voice phenomena ['EVP', sometimes called 'ITC']. The other three methods are more traditional spiritualist methods. Konstantinos does not make any assumptions about what the reader may know already -- either about technology or about spirituality. He takes you step-by-step through the whole book.According to Konstantinos, practicing mystic and occult author, contacting the dead is easier than you might think. All that is required is some basic equipment, an open mind and a willingness to try any or preferably all of the seven methods he sets forth. Unfortunately, a number of the "simple" methods presented here are likely to appeal to only a small subset of technologically savvy amateur occultists. While Konstantinos's first method uses a simple tape recorder to capture "electronic voice phenomena," he soon escalates to using radio static and white noise; by method four, the reader is expected to be experimenting with noise reduction software and positive video feedback loops. Konstantinos's own reports of spirit contact offer little incentive for such heroic efforts; the idea of listening to hours of feedback and white noise on the chance of hearing a barely discernible voice whisper something like "Not solid... more thought, more reality" will probably repel all but the most dedicated seekers. For those who can set aside the suspicion that methods one through four are merely 21st-century updates of the photographic techniques employed by fraudulent or credulous Victorians, the second section, dedicated to more traditional psychic means of contact, is ironically more persuasive. Here Konstantinos's strengthsAhis earnestness, clarity and reasonable manner of explaining techniqueAoffset his somewhat scant presentation. Thanks to these qualities, the book should still find some fans among followers of the paranormal, technologically inclined or not.
Konstantinos opens the book with a short description of the afterlife, which is reminiscent of the descriptions in Michael Newton's "Journey of Souls". Interestingly, Konstantinos then goes on to say that he has studied stage mentalist techniques and he denounces as fakes (without naming names) those mediums who make the talk show circuit giving cold readings. His point of view is that since everyone is able to communicate with deceased spirits for him- or herself, such mediums are unnecessary at best and con men at worst.
Konstantinos then moves on to a brief history of the EVP techniques the first four methods are based on, before presenting his first method for capturing spirit voices on an audio tape recorder. As the later methods are presented, they build on the ones presented earlier. The fourth method describes how to capture images from the afterlife on video tape. Konstantinos takes pains to make sure that readers have realistic expectations about the results of these methods, but he is obviously very enthusiastic about them. He wants readers to try the methods because of the experiences he's had using them.
The last three methods are completely non-technical. These sections cover scrying, "mind to mind" communication, and group communication (i.e., seances). These are so far beyond my experience that my only comments on them are that they make interesting reading and I enjoyed Konstantinos' description of his meeting with the spirit of his great-grandfather, whom he had never met while living.
The real clincher about methodology, though, was Konstantinos' saying that it's sometimes necessary to change the sampling rate to understand the speech. That is, sometimes you need to speed up or to slow down the playback of the recording to understand it. Now, if you can take that kind of liberty to interpret your data - only because "that's what works" - then who knows what you might find in it?
Konstantinos wonders, early in the book, when mainstream science will pick up on EVP techniques. That will never happen until EVP analysis ceases to be subjective. While presenting his EVP methods, he describes how he has used computers in that work. This caused me to wonder what results could be found in his EVP recordings by running them through some decent voice recognition software. Or has this been tried already?
Free eBooks (Can Be Downloaded):
Terry Findlay - Phronesis The Development Of Practical WisdomSteven Ashe - The Picatrix The Goal Of The Wise Planetary Talismanic Magic
Raymond Buckland - Bucklands Book For Spirit Communications
