Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Happiest Highlights from Monroe Institute

Since I first read about The Monroe Institute in Ostrander and Shroeder's revolutionary book: SuperLearning, I was fascinated with their work. Around 1991 I had mailed a letter to them requesting an information packet; their address was in the Appendix of SuperLearning.

I promptly received a package chock full and brimming with information. This package included a reprint from Omni magazine detailing the author's journeys into vast new realms of consciousness during a Gateway Voyage, a weeklong group journey featuring audio excursions using Hemi-Sync technology. I was enchanted by the photo in the article featuring the beautiful property nestled among the lush hills of the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia.

I absolutely had to participate. So I sent them a letter requesting an interview, telling them I wished to contribute. My sweetheart Emilie and I drove down there, from Virginia, where she attended Mary Washington University. It was fall and the leaves were absolutely beautiful. My heart thrilled at the opportunity to visit this place.

The first sight that opens up is the Gatehouse, and on top of that hill are the main buildings including a studio and research lab and a main guest house featuring a cafeteria, hall, and dozens of CHEC units.

I remember being first greeted by the laboratory engineer Dave Wallis, and then the musician and editor Mark, also the Professional Division manager Shirley Bliley and Skip Atwater, Research Director. They were initially skeptical about my participation, as they never had a staff intern or volunteer. A further writeup about my experiences can be found in the TMI focus journal and in several articles I've published.

I had a mind-blowing week at the Gateway Voyage, which the staff comped me for my contributions to their week.

I kept in touch with TMI over the years. Phillis and Arnie Popkin lived in a home literally a block away from the New Land. Arnie was an opthamologist who ran a private practice and invited me to listen to him play the piano. Phyllis reads the spirits of deceased people and pets and was written up in publications about this.

I also kept in touch with David Wallis and Leslie France, and stayed a few nights in their beautiful home carved into a mountain wall at a meadow at the end of the last road before the hill leading up to the Gatehouse. The house overlooked a large green meadow, at the end of which was a huge hill with a stream running through it. There they would throw a massive 4th of july party which was as close to heaven as I could ever imagine. Beautiful spirited people, lovely food, music, fireworks, kids and families playing, all sprawling along their beautiful two acre field.

Dave Wallis was definitely not of this world. I remember having such profound discussions about the cosmos, engineering, other life forms. One night we were driving back to their house in the snow and he revealed to me his age, I was stunned to discover he mentioned he was in his 60s.

That same summer I met Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, and volunteered at her Death and Dying center in West Virginia, an hour or two drive north of the New Land. There was a beautiful carving from one angle looked like a suffering dying man and on the other angle was an angel bringing him ascension. We were all helping to paint her center. Then one day, sad news, I heard that the center was closed because of rumors that the locals were accusing her of polluting the stream with AIDS water. I also heard rumors that the locals had burned down her house.

Also once I drove to Yogaville, VA, Sachitananda's ashram. I also went to the New House? a home near Monroe Institute in which someone from a different religion lived in each room, which was lavishly decorated with fabrics and books.

I attended this with Rita Fisher.

While at 4th year at Duke, I drove up to spend a halloween with Rita Fisher, a Swiss-German woman who was taking care of Phyllis Whitney, a writer who was living off of Robert's mountain road. I stayed at Rita's home underneath. and dressed up as Stephanie, much to the entertainment of Phyllis. Phyllis at the time was in her 70s. Her daughter and son-in-law lived next door. Ed I believe was son in law but what was daughter's name?

I also stayed at the home of Emily and Dennis Galumbeck. Looking back at these experiences I realized that I experienced such incredible bliss, why did I ever leave?

Around 1995 I also reunited with the group from the Gateway Voyage, who attended another workshop: Guidelines or Lifelines. Trish was there, so was Jennifer Lewis who lived in Atlanta.

During my gateway voyage, I also remember David Mulvey and Franceen King moderated the group experience. One of the attendees worked for the Wall-Street Journal and wrote up an article which was subsequently published in WSJ that summer but it did not accurately portray the institute slant. "Institute Shows People a Way out of their Bodies" He was an undercover reporter. I also recall Jessica a psychic, Trish Smith, who I am still close friends with and she and I are part of an extended "Psychic Friends Network." I also remember Claudius, an Austrian being of light, as well as David ?? whose last name i do not recall.

Meeting Bob Monroe in 1994 was a fascinating experience. It was one of my last few days of work or employment there. I first met him and shook his hand and he said "oh I heard about you" and I felt an electrical shock. I later suspected this electrical energy could have been something he accessed to go out of his body which he wrote about in Journeys Out of the Body, Far Journeys, and The Ultimate Journey.

I met Robert Monroe again at my going away send-off party which the staff threw for me on one of the last days of my employment. Robert appeared and told me that it would be interesting to see how my interests would expand and evolve into the future. I mentioned my integrative interests in medicine and computer science, and pre-med.

That same summer I won a scholarship to the Institute for Humane Studies and George Washington University to study Objectivism and Liberty at Bryn Mawr College. I drove through a huge hailstorm to get there.

They paid me a stipend of $100.00 per week and I was amazingly happy with that stipend, living in that area. The cost of living is amazingly cheap.

The back road which led to 151 also drove past Synchronicity, a compound run by Master Brother Charles, which offered a similar technology.

Jim and Stu lived at the top of a beautiful ski mountain just nearby TMI.

During 1995-1996 I drove up to meet Trish and Jen at their completion of Lifelines or Guidelines. I also visited some guy's house which was filled with crystals and beautiful gemstones, he built this cabin off of Roberts Mountain Road.

There was also an ice storm which I visited Rita during, which I think was around 1996-1997. amazingly we drove up to skyline drive and the ice melted on the road but stayed intact on the mountains. And we drove up to this abandoned mansion near the 151 and 29 and the highway which

Also took skip out to lunch and he wrote me letter of recommendation for medical school, which eventually I had him rewrite for graduate school

Also the new CFO comped me for the Guidelines workshop because of my ongoing contributions to TMI.

during 1994 I met Barbara Bullard, who discussed and taught Accelerated Learning to special children in Orange County and shared this at the Professional Division seminar the first one that I attended. I performed some work for her doing literature review for her.

subsequently I attended the professional division seminar during which I met Edgar Mitchell.

I also did lectures promoting the monroe institute technology and offering free demonstrations. For example, in Durham NC during a spirit in business meeting, where i met AlexSandra Lett.

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