Latest / Destination Unlimited with Victor Fuhrman / Dr. Karen Frances McCarthy – The Re-enchanted Ghost

Transcript

Dr. Karen Frances McCarthy – The Re-enchanted Ghost · Destination Unlimited with Victor Fuhrman

0:04
Speaker 1: My name is Victor Furman. Some call me the Voice.
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Speaker 1: I've always been fascinated with human nature, spirituality, science and
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Speaker 1: the crossroads at which they meet. Join me now and
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Speaker 1: we will explore these topics and so much more with
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Speaker 1: fascinating guests, authors and experts who will guide us to
0:28
Speaker 1: Destination Unlimited. Does modern American fiction portray ghosts in a
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Speaker 1: new light with continued consciousness and new approaches to spirituality?
0:45
Speaker 1: My guest this week on Destination Unlimited, medium scholar and author,
0:50
Speaker 1: doctor Karen Francis McCarthy, joins me to share her doctoral dissertation,
0:56
Speaker 1: The re Enchanted Ghost Spectral Literature in What first Century America.
1:02
Speaker 1: Doctor McCarthy is a respected medium with a deep interest
1:05
Speaker 1: in the intersections of literature, spirituality, and culture. Her books
1:10
Speaker 1: include The Other Irish, which was adopted by the Irish
1:14
Speaker 1: Government's Antisectarian and Reconciliation Initiative as a cultural outreach project,
1:20
Speaker 1: and Till Death dot Us part which explores existential questions
1:25
Speaker 1: and awakening to the concept of continued consciousness in the
1:29
Speaker 1: aftermath of her fiance's death. A former journalist and war correspondent,
1:34
Speaker 1: she has become an accomplished scholar whose writing often touches
1:38
Speaker 1: on themes of spirituality and re enchantment, and encourages readers
1:42
Speaker 1: to engage deeply with questions of empathy, meaning human connection,
1:47
Speaker 1: and the implications of continued consciousness. Her website is Karenfrancis
1:53
Speaker 1: McCarthy dot com and she joins me this week to
1:56
Speaker 1: share her path. Please join me in welcoming to Death
1:59
Speaker 1: sat the Nation Unlimited. Karen Francis McCarthy. Welcome doctor Karen.
2:05
Speaker 2: Thank you Victor. It's lovely to see you again be
2:07
Speaker 2: here again.
2:08
Speaker 1: Congratulations on earning your doctorate of Philosophy in English Literature
2:13
Speaker 1: from Britain's University of Birmingham for your dissertation The re
2:18
Speaker 1: Enchanted Ghost Spectral Literature in twenty first Century America. Before
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Speaker 1: we discuss this wonderful achievement, let's introduce you to our
2:27
Speaker 1: listeners who are meeting you for the first time. You
2:29
Speaker 1: were last on in May of twenty twenty one, discussing
2:32
Speaker 1: your book Till Death Don't Us Part. Please share with
2:36
Speaker 1: our listeners your path, your career and what inspired Till
2:40
Speaker 1: Death Don't Us Part.
2:42
Speaker 3: Well.
2:42
Speaker 2: I had been a journalist and very much a skeptic,
2:48
Speaker 2: and I was in Iraq. I was a war correspondent,
2:51
Speaker 2: so I've been working on that sort of writing that
2:53
Speaker 2: sort of world for some time. I was also covering
2:56
Speaker 2: politics the time for American Politics the Irish Times, so
3:01
Speaker 2: I was just very much focused on that sort of
3:03
Speaker 2: world for quite a while. And I was working on
3:07
Speaker 2: a book the Other Irish at the time. This was
3:11
Speaker 2: back in twenty ten when my fiance suddenly died, So
3:17
Speaker 2: the book I was working on, I was actually down
3:19
Speaker 2: in Virginia because it was part of the Northern Ireland
3:21
Speaker 2: Peace and Reconciliation Act, so it was part of an
3:25
Speaker 2: outreach project. So I was very very much steeped in
3:27
Speaker 2: that kind of world. And I was down in Virginia
3:30
Speaker 2: sort of staying in somebody's house in an attic sort
3:33
Speaker 2: of writing this the manuscript up at the time when
3:35
Speaker 2: I got a phone call from a friend in New
3:38
Speaker 2: York to say that my fiancee had just dropped out
3:42
Speaker 2: one afternoon. So and this was I ended up eventually
3:46
Speaker 2: writing this story up as until death. Jowned us part
3:50
Speaker 2: because it started happening. And I know we've talked about
3:53
Speaker 2: this before, and I'm sure many of your listeners have
3:55
Speaker 2: had these sorts of experiences where the lights start coming on,
3:58
Speaker 2: the furniture start moving, all of these sorts of things
4:00
Speaker 2: started happening. So, of course, when you're a skeptic and
4:03
Speaker 2: pride yourself on rationalism, the first thought in that is,
4:08
Speaker 2: you know, I've I'm having a breakdown, you know. But
4:11
Speaker 2: I didn't feel like I was having a breakdown. But
4:13
Speaker 2: I couldn't understand what was going on. And so I
4:16
Speaker 2: ended up one of those sort of very synchronistic series
4:20
Speaker 2: of events where I came across the Catholic priest, surprisingly enough,
4:24
Speaker 2: who told me that these were signs for our loved ones.
4:27
Speaker 2: And then I had to, as the journalists to go
4:29
Speaker 2: off and start researching if there was any validity in that.
4:32
Speaker 2: And one thing led to another. Because I was in
4:35
Speaker 2: Virginia at the time, I was sort of in the
4:37
Speaker 2: what I've called the area fifty one in the afterlife
4:39
Speaker 2: because there was a Spiritualist church nearby. I found the
4:42
Speaker 2: Edgar Casey International Headquarters were right there. The Monroe Institute
4:47
Speaker 2: is there, The University of Virginia has a department and
4:49
Speaker 2: perceptual studies that's there. So there was so much going
4:53
Speaker 2: on in this area, and sort of one thing led
4:56
Speaker 2: to another, and eventually the penny final he dropped, and
5:00
Speaker 2: I do talk about that in the book, so I
5:02
Speaker 2: won't ruin it for anybody who wants to read the book.
5:05
Speaker 2: But a sequence of events happened that eventually made me
5:09
Speaker 2: realize without doubt this was all of this activity was
5:14
Speaker 2: my partner with fiance trying to get my attention, burning bushes,
5:18
Speaker 2: as a friend of mine described them later on. So
5:21
Speaker 2: it took some time to make that turn. I had
5:24
Speaker 2: had those experiences as a child. I would wake up
5:27
Speaker 2: with strange people standing at the end of the bed,
5:30
Speaker 2: and I would see people and see things. But that
5:32
Speaker 2: had stopped in my teens and into my twenties. I
5:35
Speaker 2: really had no interest in that at all, as you don't,
5:37
Speaker 2: you get into your teens, you've got other interests besides,
5:41
Speaker 2: you know, ghosts. So it kind of had gone away.
5:44
Speaker 2: It faded away. But then here it was, decades later,
5:47
Speaker 2: back again with in full force and what I started realizing,
5:51
Speaker 2: and actually it was Peter Gobeck from the Egucasia New
5:53
Speaker 2: York had recommended. He's like, you really need to do
5:57
Speaker 2: something with this. He started seeing that, you know, we
6:00
Speaker 2: were sitting in circle and other people were popping in,
6:03
Speaker 2: you know, just finding the opportunity to pop in and
6:06
Speaker 2: give messages to their loved ones who were sitting in
6:08
Speaker 2: sitting with us in a healing circle or whatnot. And
6:11
Speaker 2: Peter was one of the people who said, you really
6:13
Speaker 2: need to do something with this. It's it's really very
6:16
Speaker 2: very helpful. And so I decided at that point I would,
6:21
Speaker 2: you know, I went and I took I stood, took
6:23
Speaker 2: a diploma in grief and Grieving Counseling at the University
6:27
Speaker 2: at the Institute of Counseling in Scotland, and I attended
6:30
Speaker 2: the Art of Finlay College and I did training there
6:32
Speaker 2: to get get three awards there. In immediate I was just,
6:36
Speaker 2: you know, it was such a hard turn for me
6:38
Speaker 2: to make, and it was such a hard place for
6:39
Speaker 2: me to have, you have to admit to being because
6:42
Speaker 2: I had come from this very sort of hardcore background
6:46
Speaker 2: up until that point that I really knew that if
6:50
Speaker 2: I wanted to sit in front of vulnerable people the
6:53
Speaker 2: way I had been, that I really wanted to know
6:56
Speaker 2: exactly what I was doing and be educated, not just
7:00
Speaker 2: have the ability to do the mediumship and give messages
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Speaker 2: and give evidence, but to actually have the education to
7:05
Speaker 2: be able to really do that properly for very vulnerable people,
7:09
Speaker 2: because I'd had some myself, very unfortunate incidences with people
7:13
Speaker 2: who called themselves mediums after my partner died, and I
7:16
Speaker 2: just didn't want to be that at all. So that's
7:19
Speaker 2: kind of how I came about it, And eventually I
7:22
Speaker 2: wrote up the story of getting to that point with
7:27
Speaker 2: in the book Till Death Don't a Sport, which of
7:29
Speaker 2: course you and I talked about.
7:30
Speaker 1: Before, And also your approach to mediumship has recently changed
7:36
Speaker 1: your philosophy about it, please tell us.
7:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, I you know, as a storyteller, I pay a
7:43
Speaker 2: lot of attention, you know, just because I also you know,
7:46
Speaker 2: being Irish were a nation of storytellers. You know that
7:48
Speaker 2: we're known for being the storytellers, having the gift to
7:52
Speaker 2: the gap and whatnot. We are the whole culture sort
7:55
Speaker 2: of revolves around storytelling in song or in story, and
8:00
Speaker 2: so it's very much part of my own makeup. But
8:03
Speaker 2: also as a writer, I sort of think in terms
8:06
Speaker 2: of story for just in general, you know, every encounter,
8:11
Speaker 2: everything that comes up, it's sort of always weaved into
8:14
Speaker 2: a story in my mind. And I started thinking within mediumship,
8:21
Speaker 2: we're sort of still working quite largely in this very
8:24
Speaker 2: old style of mediumship that has really existed since the
8:27
Speaker 2: eighteen hundreds are probably before, but certainly since the birth
8:30
Speaker 2: of spiritualism, where it's all about we have to be
8:33
Speaker 2: there to give lots and lots of facts and very
8:36
Speaker 2: specific facts to sort of prove existence. And what's happened
8:40
Speaker 2: is is that a lot of what's a lot of
8:43
Speaker 2: mediumship now is people just giving details with no story,
8:48
Speaker 2: you know, you know, it's like, oh, I've got a
8:51
Speaker 2: mother here, she's got a bunion, she's got blue slippers,
8:55
Speaker 2: and you know that's passing for mediumship. And I always think,
8:58
Speaker 2: you know, that's not the way we speak to each other.
9:02
Speaker 2: We don't go around speaking just isolated terms that would
9:06
Speaker 2: be woven into a story. If you and I were talking,
9:09
Speaker 2: if I said those three things, that would be woven
9:11
Speaker 2: into a story. And that's the way we communicate, and
9:14
Speaker 2: that's the way the spirit world is capable of communicating.
9:18
Speaker 2: And I believe once to communicate, I mean, anybody who's
9:22
Speaker 2: going to put all of that energy and effort into
9:25
Speaker 2: trying to bridge the gap, you know, to penetrate the
9:28
Speaker 2: veil to speak to their loved one here is going
9:30
Speaker 2: to have a very rich, very emotional, very moving story
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Speaker 2: that they want to share or memories that they want
9:37
Speaker 2: to share. They're not going to want to just come
9:39
Speaker 2: and give us a bunch of factoids. And then the
9:42
Speaker 2: other thing about that, too, is is we know, we
9:44
Speaker 2: know this that you can psychically pick up facts without
9:48
Speaker 2: being connected to the spirit world at all. But what
9:51
Speaker 2: you can't do is you can't pick up the presence
9:55
Speaker 2: and you can't pick up the nuances of the story psychically.
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Speaker 2: So I think it's very important for me. I've really
10:03
Speaker 2: in my own mediumship, in my own private sessions, and
10:06
Speaker 2: in my teaching now are emphasizing teaching people the art
10:12
Speaker 2: of storytelling so that we can actually give authentic voice
10:16
Speaker 2: to what the loved one is trying to tell us.
10:19
Speaker 2: Because when we can do that, the most beautiful stories,
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Speaker 2: the most beautiful detail, the most healing information actually is
10:28
Speaker 2: able to be shared. Once we know that it's possible
10:31
Speaker 2: to do that, and once we understand we have those
10:35
Speaker 2: pathways laid to be able to understand the art of
10:38
Speaker 2: storytelling to receive that, and it just makes for a
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Speaker 2: very I think different style of mediumship. I think we're
10:46
Speaker 2: in a different era now where we have very different
10:49
Speaker 2: understanding of the nature of consciousness and the continuity of consciousness,
10:54
Speaker 2: and we have a different understanding even of the nature
10:58
Speaker 2: and the makeup of the magic of the world, you know,
11:00
Speaker 2: from the early nineteen hundreds, from the New physics, and
11:04
Speaker 2: now as we move into twenty first century, we've got
11:06
Speaker 2: a new understanding, you know, through the work of like
11:09
Speaker 2: you know, charge of Chalmers and whatnot with children, different
11:13
Speaker 2: understandings of the nature of consciousness and what isn't isn't
11:16
Speaker 2: you know, what isn't possible? So I think what worked
11:19
Speaker 2: marvelously in the late eighteen hundreds and early nineteen hundreds
11:23
Speaker 2: up to around the wars marvelous. But I do think
11:26
Speaker 2: we are now in an era where we have our
11:29
Speaker 2: understanding is very different. And I think that needs to
11:32
Speaker 2: be reflected in our mediumship, because certainly the spirit world
11:37
Speaker 2: is capable of sharing that. If anybody is making our
11:40
Speaker 2: leadiumship small, it is us, because that's certainly not coming
11:44
Speaker 2: from the spirit world. So I think it really becomes now,
11:47
Speaker 2: how do we make ourselves bigger and more open and
11:52
Speaker 2: more able to really listen and share nuance and not
11:58
Speaker 2: just or to be reaching and snatching a bunch of facts.
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Speaker 1: So the fact based mediumship was called evidential mediumship. Do
12:06
Speaker 1: you have a name for your story based mediumship?
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Speaker 2: No, just just mediumship. I mean, I think, you know, evidence,
12:12
Speaker 2: it's all evidence based mediumship, because even in a story,
12:15
Speaker 2: the evidence is just detail. You know, even in a story,
12:19
Speaker 2: there's detail. You know, there's people often say and I
12:22
Speaker 2: think you and I've talked to you about this before that,
12:25
Speaker 2: oh well, if you're just sort of getting into story,
12:27
Speaker 2: it's just all fluff and emotional and there's no details
12:30
Speaker 2: in it. And I always say, well, you try to
12:31
Speaker 2: write up a book that's all fluff and emotion and
12:34
Speaker 2: see if a publisher will publish it. You know, every
12:37
Speaker 2: story has those rich details that make it a story,
12:40
Speaker 2: and it's something we need to start thinking in those terms,
12:45
Speaker 2: you know that. And that's just mediumship, you know. I mean,
12:49
Speaker 2: you can call it storytelling mediumship, but to me, it's
12:51
Speaker 2: just mediumship medium which it's just good mediumship, rich mediumship
12:56
Speaker 2: versus you know, very factual mediumship. But I think it really,
13:02
Speaker 2: I think all mediumship should be like that, because I
13:04
Speaker 2: do feel that that's what our loved ones are trying
13:07
Speaker 2: to talk to us. Like that they're trying to talk
13:09
Speaker 2: to us the way we talk to each other, the
13:11
Speaker 2: way they talk, you know, the way they always related
13:14
Speaker 2: to us here. They haven't sort of popped off to
13:16
Speaker 2: the spirit world and started speaking in monosyllables, you know.
13:20
Speaker 2: So I think it's possible to really bring a great
13:23
Speaker 2: depth of story and richness into mediumship, and we just
13:26
Speaker 2: need to be open. We just need to be open
13:28
Speaker 2: and learn the techniques to be able to do that.
13:31
Speaker 2: And I think it's important that we evolve mediumship to
13:34
Speaker 2: that place and evolve as ourselves to be really bigger
13:39
Speaker 2: and richer in our mediumship.
13:42
Speaker 1: If I may offer, how about heart centered mediumship?
13:46
Speaker 2: That's beautiful. Yeah, it's lovely. Okay.
13:50
Speaker 1: What inspired your doctoral pursuit and your dissertation the re
13:54
Speaker 1: enchanted ghost spectral literature in twenty first century America?
14:00
Speaker 2: Well, do you know, I, Victor, I was noticing because
14:03
Speaker 2: I'm an avid reader, and I was noticing that it's
14:06
Speaker 2: sort of a trend in contemporary literature and that I
14:12
Speaker 2: found quite interesting. And it was always was that, you know,
14:15
Speaker 2: my masters in literature, so it's my background really, but
14:18
Speaker 2: there was always the ghost stories, for example, were always
14:23
Speaker 2: the ghost is haunting the living. That's just the standard
14:27
Speaker 2: trope of the ghost story. And then the ghost was
14:30
Speaker 2: always sort of the you know, the sort of protagonist
14:34
Speaker 2: to antagonists, so there were the sort of the plot
14:35
Speaker 2: device to motivate the living. So like Hamlet's father wasn't
14:41
Speaker 2: the hero Hamlet was, you know, in any you know,
14:44
Speaker 2: Wuthering Heights, you know, Kathy's not really the hero as
14:47
Speaker 2: the ghost, you know, and so it becomes that's the
14:53
Speaker 2: ghost was always relegated to being sort of subordinate to
14:56
Speaker 2: the action of the living, and there were always these
14:58
Speaker 2: sort of very pasty character who didn't really have any
15:01
Speaker 2: agency of life thrown. And what I started noticing in
15:05
Speaker 2: a lot of very contemporary literature was an awful lot
15:08
Speaker 2: more of experimentation going on, and I kind of isolated
15:12
Speaker 2: it down to looking at it as it just happened
15:14
Speaker 2: to turn out that the people were doing some really
15:17
Speaker 2: innovative work in this very specific subgenre were American writers,
15:22
Speaker 2: and so I ended up focusing on some American novels
15:25
Speaker 2: and short stories that you know, spanned arrange from New
15:30
Speaker 2: York Times bestsellers to Man Booker Prize winners. Because what
15:33
Speaker 2: they were all doing was the ghost in all of
15:36
Speaker 2: these had given up haunting. The ghost was no longer
15:40
Speaker 2: on the planet haunting or lingering. The ghost had been
15:44
Speaker 2: is been moved into eliminal space or an alternate dimension
15:47
Speaker 2: or an afterlife, whatever you want to call it. But
15:50
Speaker 2: in these spaces, there's no god, it's non theological, and
15:53
Speaker 2: they're all multi tiered. Where the ghosts I'm using the
15:57
Speaker 2: word ghost victor because that's in academia, ghost inspector or
16:02
Speaker 2: the words that the terms that they use. But as
16:05
Speaker 2: these spirits or as these spirit people in spirit form
16:08
Speaker 2: continue to advance through these multidimensional liminal spaces, which is
16:11
Speaker 2: a very new departure because normally in in you know,
16:15
Speaker 2: any literature that's dealing with afterlife, we've got a god,
16:19
Speaker 2: we've got judgment, we've got redemptions. So either they're end
16:22
Speaker 2: up in heaven or hell or and now all of
16:24
Speaker 2: this is gone. You know, the heroes of the story,
16:28
Speaker 2: the people who are working through, the people who have
16:30
Speaker 2: the character arcs are the ghosts themselves, and there's no
16:35
Speaker 2: concern with getting back counting the living this that or
16:38
Speaker 2: the other, you know, And so it was just sort
16:40
Speaker 2: of this really interesting development. I was like, why is
16:43
Speaker 2: the ghost now becoming the hero, and why is the
16:48
Speaker 2: location being shifted to this very sort of sophisticated and
16:52
Speaker 2: nuanced liminal space and not a theological heaven. And so
16:57
Speaker 2: I found I was quite interested in what was going
17:00
Speaker 2: on there. So I started looking at a lot of
17:03
Speaker 2: literature to see what the patterns were, and then I
17:05
Speaker 2: kind of got into I wrote out, the whole introduction
17:07
Speaker 2: is really about our shift and consciousness, our shift and
17:11
Speaker 2: understanding both of the nature of reality, the nature of consciousness,
17:16
Speaker 2: but also the sort of a more recent shift, I say,
17:21
Speaker 2: recent polis starting in the sixties, largely towards the sort
17:24
Speaker 2: of spiritual but not religious type of movement, the new
17:27
Speaker 2: religious movements where there's no actual religious dogma involved. It
17:32
Speaker 2: was really more of a curated personal spirituality. And you
17:38
Speaker 2: know how much how sort of freeing that becomes to
17:43
Speaker 2: start to explore other narratives, And that sort of really
17:46
Speaker 2: was what my interest became in the literature. But it's
17:48
Speaker 2: also what's feeding my interest in evolving mediumship.
17:53
Speaker 1: And you elaborate on how ghosts are reimagined as agents
17:57
Speaker 1: of transformation and healing in your work.
18:01
Speaker 2: So in the research that I was doing, yeah, what
18:06
Speaker 2: I found was you know, the ghosts through spirits have
18:09
Speaker 2: always in literature been figures of being traumatized, figures even
18:15
Speaker 2: a lot of the time they've been murdered or you know,
18:18
Speaker 2: something has gone wrong in these ghost stories. So the
18:22
Speaker 2: ghosts has traditionally been sort of a figure of trauma.
18:27
Speaker 2: What I found in the new literature is that the
18:30
Speaker 2: ghosts trauma they work through, so they don't work through
18:34
Speaker 2: it by sort of trying to out their murder, which
18:38
Speaker 2: is the old school way of telling ghost stories. You know,
18:40
Speaker 2: let me go back and give a serial haunt this
18:43
Speaker 2: person so I can reveal the identity of my killer
18:46
Speaker 2: or reveal where you know, the body is or whatever.
18:50
Speaker 2: These are are moving forward through space in very very
18:55
Speaker 2: human relatable ways, trying to come to terms with the
19:00
Speaker 2: trauma that they're carrying from life through death into their
19:06
Speaker 2: continued existence on the next plane, and how they are
19:10
Speaker 2: arriving at becoming restored from that trauma. Say, with so
19:17
Speaker 2: Freudian psychology, for example, they say that trauma really can
19:20
Speaker 2: never be quite healed because it's what they call non representable.
19:24
Speaker 2: In other words, usually happens before we have language, or
19:28
Speaker 2: it's usually happening in the nervous system beyond language, so
19:33
Speaker 2: we can never quite articulate a trauma story. And so
19:39
Speaker 2: you know, a lot of trauma literature is focused on
19:42
Speaker 2: how do we talk about the trauma? And what these
19:44
Speaker 2: writers have done is something quite interesting where we've they've
19:48
Speaker 2: just sort of acknowledged that restoration from trauma can't come
19:53
Speaker 2: from trying to retell the story over and over and
19:56
Speaker 2: over again. It comes from ultimately, and I'm greatly oversimplifying
20:02
Speaker 2: the literature here, but just in the interests of time,
20:05
Speaker 2: it comes from ultimately recognizing interconnection and the importance of service,
20:11
Speaker 2: and the importance of being present and willing for another.
20:19
Speaker 1: So, in essence, the spirit the ghost has come to
20:24
Speaker 1: be a doctor, to be a healer.
20:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I suppose you could put it like that
20:29
Speaker 2: in that way, Yeah, for themselves and others.
20:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I'll also share that message of healing, which
20:34
Speaker 1: is so important, especially in our world today.
20:36
Speaker 2: Yes. Absolutely.
20:38
Speaker 1: My guest is doctor Karen Francis McCarthy. We're talking about
20:42
Speaker 1: her dissertation for her doctorate, the re Enchanted Ghost, Spectral
20:47
Speaker 1: Literature in the twenty first century America. Karen, please share
20:50
Speaker 1: with our listeners where they can find out more about
20:52
Speaker 1: you and your amazing work.
20:55
Speaker 2: Well, I suppose the easy thing to do is to
20:57
Speaker 2: pop along to my website Karen Frances McCarthy dot com
21:02
Speaker 2: and quite a lot of stuff there. There's also quite
21:05
Speaker 2: a lot of free stuff there. We've got a community there,
21:07
Speaker 2: so anybody's interested in talks are recommended reading and we
21:10
Speaker 2: have to add your books, your poetry books, ficture to
21:13
Speaker 2: that as well. Now, there's quite a lot of free
21:16
Speaker 2: resources there for anybody starting to step into this and
21:19
Speaker 2: wants to find out more.
21:21
Speaker 1: And I know that you change your schedule about is
21:23
Speaker 1: there anything you'd like to feature or offer right now?
21:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm I'm offering for anybody sort of starting out
21:31
Speaker 2: on this path, starting out on the path to healing
21:34
Speaker 2: or transwork or mediumship. We've built quite a We've built
21:38
Speaker 2: six undemanded master classes that have monthly practiced live practice circles,
21:44
Speaker 2: so there's a live component to keep people involved and engage,
21:48
Speaker 2: so if anyone is starting out that you can start
21:51
Speaker 2: there with the master classes in your own time. And
21:53
Speaker 2: I also have a Facebook group so that people can
21:56
Speaker 2: kind of engage with each other, so you know, master
21:58
Speaker 2: classes can be very isolated things. If you don't have
22:01
Speaker 2: other people to connect with. And then after you know,
22:05
Speaker 2: if people do those the beginner's classes, I'm giving now
22:09
Speaker 2: a certificate of completion on the submitting of once they
22:13
Speaker 2: submit their logs, and then they can come along and
22:16
Speaker 2: do live advanced classes with me, which focus much more
22:20
Speaker 2: on storytelling and embodiment and presence. So that's really where
22:26
Speaker 2: I've got where I'm going with mediumship this year. And
22:29
Speaker 2: I do have a couple of trans classes that have
22:31
Speaker 2: the one class I know both you and I are
22:33
Speaker 2: both great, very fond of which is Aggo Casey trans Healing,
22:37
Speaker 2: which has just started. And then I do transcommunication as well,
22:42
Speaker 2: soilperbirds transcommunication. So I'm really focusing more now on moving
22:46
Speaker 2: into a more advanced I suppose for one of a
22:50
Speaker 2: better word, more experimental and a more sophisticated wave approaching
22:55
Speaker 2: mediumship and trans work. So I'm doing some esp you
23:00
Speaker 2: work as well with We'll be inviting a long doctor,
23:03
Speaker 2: Cal Cooper from the University of Northampton, so we'll be
23:06
Speaker 2: doing some talking about extra sensory perception as well and
23:09
Speaker 2: the way it's being approached within the parapsychology field, just
23:13
Speaker 2: things like that. So I'm really trying to move the dialogue.
23:18
Speaker 2: Move the dial a little bit on the dialogue this.
23:20
Speaker 1: Year, and we'll be back with more of Karen after
23:23
Speaker 1: these words on the Own Times Radio Network.
23:27
Speaker 4: The cutting edge of conscious Radio, Home Times Radio IOMFM.
23:32
Speaker 4: Home Times Magazine is one of the leading online content
23:35
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23:59
Speaker 1: Back on the Nation Unlimited. My guest this week, doctor
24:02
Speaker 1: Karen Francis McCarthy. We're talking about her dissertation there re
24:07
Speaker 1: Enchantment Ghost Spectral Literature in the twenty first century America. Karen,
24:12
Speaker 1: in the last segment, we were talking a little bit
24:14
Speaker 1: about ghosts as agents of healing. In your analysis of
24:19
Speaker 1: novels like The Lovely Bones and The Five People You
24:22
Speaker 1: Meet in Heaven, you explore how ghosts navigate emotional and
24:26
Speaker 1: spiritual journeys. How can these stories offer healing for the reader?
24:32
Speaker 3: Well?
24:32
Speaker 2: I think they're very human. I mean, as I said,
24:35
Speaker 2: you know, the ghosts in these novels are just the
24:39
Speaker 2: continued consciousness of individuals who were here, who you know.
24:42
Speaker 2: In The Lovely Bones, the leading character Susie Simon was murdered.
24:47
Speaker 2: In Five People You Meet in Heaven, Eddie, the maintenance
24:51
Speaker 2: guy you know, died trying to save a small child
24:54
Speaker 2: on a farrisheel ride. And I think that the way
25:00
Speaker 2: the specter, if I can call it spector spirit has
25:03
Speaker 2: been approached in these novels is not as as I
25:07
Speaker 2: mentioned earlier, not as sort of a two dimensional character,
25:10
Speaker 2: but as you know, real fully fleshed out characters with challenges,
25:17
Speaker 2: with arcs, with development the same way as they would
25:20
Speaker 2: if the characters were alive. And this is really a
25:22
Speaker 2: difference in the way the ghost has been treated. The
25:24
Speaker 2: thing about having a spectr in liminal space, of course,
25:27
Speaker 2: is that there is also the added benefit of all
25:30
Speaker 2: of the things that can be done in liminal space
25:33
Speaker 2: that can't be done in the physical, Like you know,
25:35
Speaker 2: having these very very imaginative environments. In Albam's work, Eddy
25:41
Speaker 2: sort of can move through five different what he calls
25:43
Speaker 2: different heavens to meet different people. So we have this
25:46
Speaker 2: sort of really wonderful imaginative component to these novels as well,
25:51
Speaker 2: just by virtue of the facts that they're in eliminal space.
25:54
Speaker 2: But what it does is it makes it, I suppose,
25:57
Speaker 2: where we're sort of able to remove sort of limitations
26:01
Speaker 2: and practicalities of just the day to day grind of
26:03
Speaker 2: living and be able to move into a more imaginative
26:06
Speaker 2: space where we can be more open to sort of
26:08
Speaker 2: seeing and understanding things that perhaps we didn't see or
26:12
Speaker 2: understand when we were here that really help us to heal. So,
26:17
Speaker 2: for example, in five People, Eddie the Maintenance Guide, they
26:22
Speaker 2: actually made a movie out of this. I can't remember
26:25
Speaker 2: the name. It's probably called Five People. He dies trying
26:29
Speaker 2: to save a job. But he actually feels like he
26:31
Speaker 2: had this completely useless, worthless life. He feels like he
26:34
Speaker 2: had a life that really amounted to nothing. He was
26:37
Speaker 2: just like he was just he had a he had
26:39
Speaker 2: a no he had a nothing life, he thinks. And
26:42
Speaker 2: so he's lived out his life. He's been through the war,
26:44
Speaker 2: he's got PTSD, he's he hasn't really he doesn't feel
26:47
Speaker 2: like he's done anything meaningful or worthwhile with his life.
26:50
Speaker 2: And when he gets into when he dies, you know, physically,
26:54
Speaker 2: and he ends up in the first heaven, he meets
26:56
Speaker 2: somebody he knew or somebody he met in his physical
27:01
Speaker 2: life who teaches them a lessons. So it's a very
27:03
Speaker 2: fable like it's a very easy read. It's a very
27:05
Speaker 2: fable like novel where he goes through basically five different
27:09
Speaker 2: stories and really all of them are geared towards showing
27:14
Speaker 2: how life had meaning. And what's actually very interesting in
27:17
Speaker 2: that Victor is that if you and I cited quite
27:21
Speaker 2: a few studies when I was reading this of sort
27:25
Speaker 2: of a contemporary epidemic of loneliness, a sort of a
27:30
Speaker 2: sense of a loss of meaning in life's life, a
27:33
Speaker 2: loss of purpose in life that didn't sort of exist,
27:36
Speaker 2: for example, when we had more organ you know, more
27:40
Speaker 2: adherence to more organized religions where the priest or the
27:43
Speaker 2: pastor the reverend or God or the Bible or whatever
27:45
Speaker 2: your religious book was sort of told you you had meaning.
27:48
Speaker 2: But when we are moving now into the more sort
27:51
Speaker 2: of pow secular I call it curated sort of spiritualism,
27:55
Speaker 2: where it becomes more or spirituality where it becomes more
27:59
Speaker 2: about what resonates with you as an individual. What we've
28:07
Speaker 2: been finding is is that there has been an epidemic
28:10
Speaker 2: of loneliness. I mean, Britain has a Minister for Lowliness now,
28:14
Speaker 2: you know, to try to combat this problem, exacerbated of
28:17
Speaker 2: course by COVID. And so I also another writer much
28:22
Speaker 2: earlier that I cite quite a lot was Victor Frankel,
28:25
Speaker 2: who wrote quite a lot about what he discovered gave
28:29
Speaker 2: life meaning. And so I think all of these spectras,
28:32
Speaker 2: all of these goats in these novels, in their different ways,
28:35
Speaker 2: are tackling these questions that are very pertinent questions for
28:41
Speaker 2: all of us in our physical lives running around on
28:44
Speaker 2: our feet. And like I said, they can explore them
28:47
Speaker 2: in the more sort of liminal magical environment, which is
28:50
Speaker 2: able to highlight things that perhaps wouldn't be highlighted if
28:54
Speaker 2: they were just set here on the planet. You know.
28:57
Speaker 2: But the questions that are coming up and the issues
29:01
Speaker 2: that are coming up that these goes through these spirits
29:03
Speaker 2: are having to contend with are very rare issues that
29:06
Speaker 2: we are all actually contending with here on a daily
29:09
Speaker 2: basis in one way, shape or form.
29:12
Speaker 1: Absolutely, And to that end, the move away from the
29:16
Speaker 1: more traditional religious teachings toward a more personal spirituality on
29:20
Speaker 1: a practical level. How do you see that manifesting in
29:23
Speaker 1: the world today.
29:25
Speaker 2: Well, I think what's happening, and I mean, obviously this
29:28
Speaker 2: is not a universal thing, but I do feel what's happening,
29:30
Speaker 2: and I feel like largely there's been a sort of
29:33
Speaker 2: a curated spirituality that has been sort of evolving largely
29:38
Speaker 2: since perhaps the sixties. I mean, I know, the theosphits
29:41
Speaker 2: were around in the eighties or in the eighteen hundreds,
29:43
Speaker 2: but in terms of reaching sort of the broader public,
29:46
Speaker 2: you know, once we get into the countercultural movement, you know,
29:49
Speaker 2: the sixties, we started finding, you know, the arrival of
29:54
Speaker 2: Eastern spiritualities, you know, and this has kind of moved
29:57
Speaker 2: us on from there. We now have the language of quantums,
30:01
Speaker 2: short of you know, melted its way into almost everyday lexicon.
30:07
Speaker 2: We've just a different way of thinking about things.
30:10
Speaker 3: We have.
30:10
Speaker 2: The near death experience, for example, has really broken an
30:16
Speaker 2: awful lot of ground and how we think about what
30:18
Speaker 2: happens when we die, because we've always had these notions
30:22
Speaker 2: that arise from organized traditional religions that you die and
30:27
Speaker 2: you are rewarded or punished, and then the near death
30:31
Speaker 2: literature that's been you know, emerging since Raymond Moody started
30:34
Speaker 2: writing about there in the seventies, really is showing us.
30:37
Speaker 2: So that's not the case. So I think that there
30:41
Speaker 2: has been a sort of a cultural shift in how
30:44
Speaker 2: we think about who we are and as spiritual beings
30:49
Speaker 2: what happens when we die? You know, we know, we
30:54
Speaker 2: know this from mediumship, that you don't just die and
30:56
Speaker 2: go sprout wings. You know, you die and you continue
30:59
Speaker 2: on very consistent way with the way the spirits in
31:02
Speaker 2: these books and these novels have been continuing on, even
31:06
Speaker 2: though these authors are not spiritualist particularly, I mean, George
31:10
Speaker 2: Saunders is admits to being sort of a Christian but
31:15
Speaker 2: also Buddhist and has sort of curated his own belief
31:20
Speaker 2: system out of that. So I think that that sort
31:25
Speaker 2: of idea of postsecularism where we've kin't arrived at a
31:29
Speaker 2: point now where the secular paradigm has not manifested you
31:34
Speaker 2: know where, and it has not really served us, And
31:37
Speaker 2: now we were in an era where people are looking
31:40
Speaker 2: for something. It's sort of a Tilo's greater than the
31:43
Speaker 2: Self that doesn't necessarily involve an authoritarian God and so
31:49
Speaker 2: we're into this sort of more curated, you know, sort
31:54
Speaker 2: of syncretic spirituality that's heavily influenced by Eastern religions from
32:00
Speaker 2: our cultures. I mean, the one thing about ghost literature
32:02
Speaker 2: I will say is that it has always reflected the
32:08
Speaker 2: culture from which it has emerged. So the Gothic ghost
32:12
Speaker 2: was very different from the medieval ghost, and it's very
32:15
Speaker 2: different from the contemporary ghost. That's one thing. You can
32:18
Speaker 2: almost always look at a ghost story and tell from
32:21
Speaker 2: reading the story what the concerns of the culture are
32:24
Speaker 2: at the time that that ghost story was written. And
32:28
Speaker 2: so I think that's what our contemporary ghost stories are
32:31
Speaker 2: holding a mirror up to some of the issues that
32:34
Speaker 2: we are facing and dealing with today in our culture
32:38
Speaker 2: as a result of the sort of decline of organized religions.
32:43
Speaker 2: And I say that because obviously it's not across the board,
32:45
Speaker 2: but there has been a decline in people practicing organized
32:50
Speaker 2: religions in the authority people have assigned to priests and
32:53
Speaker 2: pastors and whatnot, and then just sort of this need
32:57
Speaker 2: to turn to something that sort of speaks to people
33:02
Speaker 2: better than say, what they grew up with.
33:06
Speaker 1: You touched upon liminal spaces before your research emphasizes liminal spaces,
33:11
Speaker 1: those in between realms of transformation. How did these spaces
33:15
Speaker 1: in modern ghost stories invite readers to reconsider the boundaries
33:19
Speaker 1: between life and death, the material and the spiritual.
33:24
Speaker 2: Well, I think the fact that they are non theological
33:28
Speaker 2: and the fact that they are multi dimensional. I mean,
33:31
Speaker 2: in The Lovely Bones, the main character Suzy, she arrives
33:36
Speaker 2: in small what she called small Heaven, and she realizes
33:40
Speaker 2: then there's another space that's called the in between, which
33:43
Speaker 2: is where she can kind of pop in and see
33:45
Speaker 2: and watch her family on the planet, and then there
33:48
Speaker 2: is the wide, wide heaven where she ends up going,
33:52
Speaker 2: you know, advancing to to meet her grandfather. In an
33:57
Speaker 2: album obviously presents us with five different heavens that our
34:02
Speaker 2: character moves through. They're five different first heavens. And then
34:06
Speaker 2: once he moves through these five different first sevens, he
34:09
Speaker 2: gets to go to his second heaven. So it's just
34:11
Speaker 2: as of this interesting, you know, the same with George Saunders.
34:15
Speaker 2: They're all in what they call the Bardo, and every
34:20
Speaker 2: so often the border is interrupted by the arrival of
34:23
Speaker 2: angels what they call angels, who try to get them
34:26
Speaker 2: to move to a space beyond the border, and these
34:28
Speaker 2: spaces are not defined, you know, they don't have clear boundaries,
34:34
Speaker 2: they don't have clear set of the laws of physics
34:36
Speaker 2: the way the physical spaces have, and so they leave
34:39
Speaker 2: a lot open to the imagination, but also really recognize
34:45
Speaker 2: the power of perception in creating these sorts of liminal
34:50
Speaker 2: spaces as well. So I think what I love about
34:53
Speaker 2: Josh Saunders in particular is that he gets very comfortable
34:57
Speaker 2: with the idea of uncertainty, which is a very core
35:00
Speaker 2: I mean, I've practiced Buddhism for twenty five years, so
35:03
Speaker 2: the idea of getting comfortable with uncertainty is very core
35:07
Speaker 2: teaching in Buddhism, and so it's a kind of interesting
35:13
Speaker 2: that the characters get to be comfortable in that. And
35:18
Speaker 2: I feel that if we were able to get comfortable
35:21
Speaker 2: like them, we would end up having an easier time
35:24
Speaker 2: the way they end up having an easier time towards
35:27
Speaker 2: the end of these plots.
35:29
Speaker 1: That makes sense absolutely. In your segment The Brief History
35:33
Speaker 1: of the Dead, you discuss ecospectrality and its connection to
35:38
Speaker 1: environmental themes. How do ghost stories reflect our relationship with
35:42
Speaker 1: the environment and our need for re enchantment.
35:46
Speaker 2: Yeah. So Kevin Brockmeier has done some. Really, He's written some.
35:51
Speaker 2: He's written a collection of ghost stories as well, The
35:54
Speaker 2: Ghost Variations, which anybody likes short story, I recommend. It's
35:58
Speaker 2: great fun, lads of thought EXPERI and some really great
36:01
Speaker 2: clever ideas in there. But in his novel The Brief
36:04
Speaker 2: History of the Dead, it's kind of like it's like
36:08
Speaker 2: a post apocalyptic or it's like an apocalyptic thing where
36:11
Speaker 2: he got this really clever connection between the living and
36:15
Speaker 2: the dead and the idea I think it's an old
36:18
Speaker 2: I think it's a Nigerian idea. I know it comes
36:21
Speaker 2: from a lot of indigenous religions as well, that you
36:24
Speaker 2: exist on that you exist in spirits, in liminal space
36:27
Speaker 2: where as long as somebody on the planet or remembers you,
36:30
Speaker 2: and what's happening is is that we are destroyed. And
36:33
Speaker 2: it's a really clever book. I definitely recommend it. It's
36:35
Speaker 2: a great read. It's very entertaining as well, but it's
36:37
Speaker 2: also very deep. But you could just read it just
36:41
Speaker 2: purely for entertainment, or you could really get really into
36:43
Speaker 2: it like I did. He has this we've got a
36:47
Speaker 2: situation where where the humans have basically destroyed the planet,
36:52
Speaker 2: and now there's a pandemic, has Compton kill off everybody,
36:55
Speaker 2: and we have melted the polar ice caps to make
36:59
Speaker 2: coco to make and use the water to make Coca cola,
37:02
Speaker 2: and I just destroyed the place. And so there's only
37:05
Speaker 2: by the time we get to the book, middle of
37:07
Speaker 2: the book, there's only one human left on the planet.
37:10
Speaker 2: But meanwhile, there's another place called the city where all
37:12
Speaker 2: the spirits are that she has met in her life,
37:15
Speaker 2: and they're all there and they don't quite know what's
37:18
Speaker 2: going on either. And every time somebody on the planet dies,
37:22
Speaker 2: the person that they were connected to in the next
37:25
Speaker 2: place in the city, those people disappear to whatever else
37:28
Speaker 2: comes after that. And so it's just this really kind
37:32
Speaker 2: of fun, interesting way of thinking about consciousness and connection.
37:37
Speaker 2: But it's also sort of couched in the very real
37:41
Speaker 2: tragedy of impending climate disaster, and so in a way
37:46
Speaker 2: it sort of, you know, presents this really out there idea,
37:52
Speaker 2: which when we think about it's not really that out
37:54
Speaker 2: there at all.
37:56
Speaker 1: You've blended academic scholarship with personal spiritual practice as a
38:01
Speaker 1: medium and a teacher. How has your personal experience shaped
38:05
Speaker 1: your academic approach to spectral literature.
38:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's a that's an interesting question because I
38:12
Speaker 2: think when I started working on this first, I think,
38:15
Speaker 2: you know, within the academic world, people sort of wondering
38:20
Speaker 2: why I was looking at it the way I was
38:22
Speaker 2: looking at it, and because most people who write about
38:26
Speaker 2: spectrality are sort of writing from the perspective of haunting,
38:30
Speaker 2: you know, or the spectrum being haunted, or some kind
38:33
Speaker 2: of form of trauma or whatever. But I was approaching
38:36
Speaker 2: it from the vantage point of the ghost through real
38:39
Speaker 2: they exist, because once you accept that they're real and
38:43
Speaker 2: they exist sort of opens up a whole other dialogue,
38:48
Speaker 2: you know, And so I was approaching so that was
38:51
Speaker 2: my vantage point, Well, well, the ghost through real, So
38:53
Speaker 2: now what do we do with them, you know, as
38:55
Speaker 2: opposed to sort of getting hung up on whether they're real,
38:58
Speaker 2: whether they or not, whether they're metaphor, which is where
39:00
Speaker 2: sort of spectral literature usually places the ghost of some
39:03
Speaker 2: sort of form of metaphor. But because of my own experience,
39:06
Speaker 2: as I came at this saying, well, I'm starting from
39:09
Speaker 2: the assumption that the ghost are all real, and now
39:13
Speaker 2: what happens, you know, And so I think that made
39:16
Speaker 2: it for kind of a bit of a different approach
39:19
Speaker 2: than is normally taken, and I think it took people
39:21
Speaker 2: a little while to get to the fact that that's
39:24
Speaker 2: where I'm starting from, and then they just kind of
39:27
Speaker 2: went with it with you know, after that with me.
39:29
Speaker 2: But I really do think that once, and there's something
39:34
Speaker 2: I would love to see more within the mediumship community
39:36
Speaker 2: as well, is once we dispense with the question of
39:42
Speaker 2: is the ghost or is the spirit real? Or is
39:44
Speaker 2: continued as the afterlife? Or is whatever real? If we
39:47
Speaker 2: get rid of that question, if we just start from
39:49
Speaker 2: assuming well that's a given. Now what now, where? What's
39:55
Speaker 2: there for us to discuss? What's there to explore, then
39:58
Speaker 2: I think we can get into much more more interesting
40:00
Speaker 2: conversations than is the spirit real? Is ghosts real? Do
40:05
Speaker 2: we really survive? To test? You know, those questions? As
40:09
Speaker 2: a medium, I don't find the very interesting because it's
40:12
Speaker 2: sort of I feel like they're very you know, so
40:14
Speaker 2: I kind of know well that already I really want
40:16
Speaker 2: to move into something that's a little bit more inspired,
40:18
Speaker 2: a little bit more you know, insightful, something that can
40:23
Speaker 2: really open up new avenues to explore and discover and
40:27
Speaker 2: understand about consciousness and mediumship and the continuation of consciousness,
40:32
Speaker 2: and how we relate to people and to our loved
40:35
Speaker 2: ones who have passed on, and indeed, you know where
40:38
Speaker 2: this whole journey for ourselves goes, you know, I think
40:42
Speaker 2: we need to once we can get rid of this idea,
40:44
Speaker 2: these old school ideas, then I think we we really
40:48
Speaker 2: open in a whole new playing field. I hope, you know,
40:50
Speaker 2: for a whole new playing fields that we can just
40:53
Speaker 2: really now start to explore in sort of more tangible
40:59
Speaker 2: or semi time terms, you know, theories about what can
41:02
Speaker 2: be going on there or what can you know, just
41:04
Speaker 2: lots and lots of opportunity for much more interesting conversation,
41:08
Speaker 2: not to.
41:09
Speaker 1: Mention the bringing of peace. Yes, I guess Karen Francis McCarthy,
41:14
Speaker 1: we'll be back with more after these words on the
41:16
Speaker 1: Old Times Radio Network.
41:18
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42:25
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42:30
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42:35
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42:41
Speaker 6: Hi, this is Bill mar I can find humor in
42:43
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42:46
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42:49
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42:55
Speaker 1: Oh back on Destination Unlimited. My guests this week doctor
43:00
Speaker 1: Karen Francis McCarthy. We're talking about her dissertation The re
43:04
Speaker 1: Enchanted Ghost Spectral Literature in twenty first century America. Karen,
43:09
Speaker 1: your work emphasizes the healing power of stories. How can literature,
43:14
Speaker 1: particularly ghost stories, service tools for personal and collective transformation?
43:21
Speaker 2: I think anything that sort of shakes the apple cars
43:25
Speaker 2: and offers us a new perspective, in a new way
43:28
Speaker 2: of looking at something can be very very healing and
43:32
Speaker 2: certainly very very worth it. The thing about sort of
43:35
Speaker 2: I mean that goes for any really any art, any
43:38
Speaker 2: form of art performance, you know, visual arts, writing, anything
43:43
Speaker 2: at all within you know, my field of spectral literature.
43:48
Speaker 2: I think what I particularly like is how when we
43:51
Speaker 2: kind of remove the barriers of sort of physical expectations
43:55
Speaker 2: and sort of the laws of physics, we really are
44:00
Speaker 2: opening up different ways that can be We're free to
44:05
Speaker 2: sort of explore different ways, turn things upside down, sort
44:08
Speaker 2: of present thought experiments because the sort of freed from
44:12
Speaker 2: the requirements of things having to necessarily make sense, if
44:16
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, And so I think once
44:18
Speaker 2: we can get into that, then we're into a position
44:21
Speaker 2: where can really go, oh, that's interesting, that is interesting.
44:25
Speaker 2: And so just very briefly, there's one story that Kevin
44:29
Speaker 2: Brockmeyer tells, and I don't remember the name but at
44:31
Speaker 2: the moment, but it's it's where an old man has
44:38
Speaker 2: been seeing the ghost of a young man.
44:43
Speaker 4: You know.
44:44
Speaker 2: The old man kept seeing this young man all this time,
44:47
Speaker 2: and you would this young man would appear to him
44:49
Speaker 2: as you know, as a ghost. And then over the
44:51
Speaker 2: years this man would would appear you would be older
44:54
Speaker 2: and older and older, you know, and it turns out
44:58
Speaker 2: that the ghost was actually the young man, now that
45:03
Speaker 2: the real person was the young man. The ghost was
45:05
Speaker 2: the old man, you know. And so you just sind
45:07
Speaker 2: to get into these sort of way what happened there,
45:09
Speaker 2: you know, And it's kind of an interesting way to
45:12
Speaker 2: look at it. I hear somebody thinking, I've been seeing
45:15
Speaker 2: this ghost all my life, and it turns out now
45:17
Speaker 2: you're the ghost. You've been seeing a young man growing
45:21
Speaker 2: through his life, you know. And it's just a really
45:23
Speaker 2: interesting way of challenging our perspectives. And I think that's
45:26
Speaker 2: something when we start moving into those sort of spaces
45:31
Speaker 2: that are allowed the imagination to run like that. It
45:35
Speaker 2: really can provoke some thought, some reflection, you know, some
45:39
Speaker 2: sort of really looking at God. You know, do I
45:41
Speaker 2: have that kind of way? You know? And it really
45:43
Speaker 2: challenges us to challenge our own perceptions, which is mare
45:46
Speaker 2: of us. I think anything that makes us reflect and
45:48
Speaker 2: challenge our own perceptions is a positive thing.
45:52
Speaker 1: And this is this re enchantment that you discuss. How
45:55
Speaker 1: does this concept help us reconnect with the sense of
45:59
Speaker 1: wonder and mystery in a world that often feels disconnected
46:03
Speaker 1: and disenfranchised.
46:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, so there was a there was a sort of
46:08
Speaker 2: a sort of literary theory or anything in philosophy and sociology.
46:12
Speaker 2: I think that you know, that emerged called disenchantment Max
46:14
Speaker 2: Weber's idea of the disenchantment of the West. And it's
46:18
Speaker 2: really that we've come to a point where we failed
46:21
Speaker 2: to see the magic that we are. So many terrible
46:25
Speaker 2: things have happened. You know, how can we guide with
46:27
Speaker 2: this sort of innocent sort of seeing the elementals in
46:30
Speaker 2: the what we We didn't talk like that, but you know,
46:32
Speaker 2: I'm extrapolating, how can we go out and see that
46:35
Speaker 2: sort of magic? When there's just been this overall sense
46:38
Speaker 2: of just disenchantment in the world. And the idea of
46:43
Speaker 2: re enchantment is not a sort of a return to
46:46
Speaker 2: this very sort of naive where we see sort of
46:49
Speaker 2: varies and elementals. It's really more of a way of
46:53
Speaker 2: living through the trauma that we all experience in one way,
46:56
Speaker 2: shape or form in our physical existence. You know, we
47:01
Speaker 2: were all facing challenges and difficulties in the nature of
47:03
Speaker 2: the physical, physical world. But how can we We can't
47:07
Speaker 2: go back to an enchanted place where we were six
47:10
Speaker 2: months old or one year old and or a little
47:13
Speaker 2: child and we thought everything was magical. We can't get
47:16
Speaker 2: back to that because that would be sort of delusional,
47:19
Speaker 2: because we know that's not the nature of the world.
47:21
Speaker 2: But we can move forward towards re enchantment, and we
47:25
Speaker 2: can move forwards towards re enchantment, which is finding the
47:29
Speaker 2: light in the world without delusion.
47:33
Speaker 1: How do these stories help us in dealing with grief?
47:38
Speaker 2: Well, I think when we again, part of it is
47:43
Speaker 2: I think the work I do within mediumships probably more
47:47
Speaker 2: tangible in this way than fiction. But I do think
47:50
Speaker 2: that because these are fictional stories, I do think just
47:53
Speaker 2: the idea that they provoked, this idea of a continued
47:57
Speaker 2: consciousness in very very intelligent, clever, creative ways. It really
48:01
Speaker 2: makes us have to think. And then when you look
48:04
Speaker 2: at the actual the you know, the authors themselves, and
48:08
Speaker 2: this the sort of the space they live in that
48:10
Speaker 2: has created these beautiful creative pieces, you sort of have
48:15
Speaker 2: to put some stock in Well, if that person's had
48:18
Speaker 2: that experience, maybe there's some truth to it. I would
48:22
Speaker 2: say in terms of helping with grief, I would say
48:25
Speaker 2: something like my memorial Death don't just port, which is
48:28
Speaker 2: a real life journey, you know, creative nonfiction that sort
48:32
Speaker 2: of comes with a lot of experiences that really would
48:37
Speaker 2: make people question my God, like this is real. There's
48:40
Speaker 2: really could be real. You know my lovedo's is still here.
48:44
Speaker 2: You know that's what comes with mediumship as well. You
48:46
Speaker 2: know that no, wait, hand on a second, this there's
48:50
Speaker 2: some there's some veracity here. There's some truth to all
48:53
Speaker 2: of this that I think can really help us with grief.
48:57
Speaker 2: That idea that death is not the end and that
49:01
Speaker 2: we are unconditionally loved, always have been, and always will be.
49:07
Speaker 2: I think that's marvelous way of really both removing the
49:11
Speaker 2: fear of death, which is a huge thing, but also
49:15
Speaker 2: really taking that feeling of grief way so that there's
49:18
Speaker 2: not quite that there's the physical loss, but not quite
49:23
Speaker 2: this complete and absolute loss that that person's gone from
49:26
Speaker 2: my sight forever, that that person has gone from my
49:29
Speaker 2: site very temporarily. And so I think that when we
49:33
Speaker 2: start looking at those sorts of experiences and stories that
49:38
Speaker 2: people have that we can do through spiritualism or do
49:41
Speaker 2: through mediumship, I think those are mentally helpful. But I
49:46
Speaker 2: will say that with the caveat that, you know, physical
49:51
Speaker 2: loss needs to be grieved, so we still have to
49:54
Speaker 2: grieve a loss. We're always grieving something.
50:00
Speaker 1: How many embracing the spiritual and mysterious dimensions of life
50:05
Speaker 1: help us find meaning in an increasingly materialistic world.
50:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I think that kind of comes back to
50:14
Speaker 2: sort of these ideas of the sort of the idea
50:19
Speaker 2: of loneliness and the idea of sort of disconnection, the
50:23
Speaker 2: sort of the breakdown of the community and the family
50:26
Speaker 2: that you know, we've had, we've seen happen in the
50:28
Speaker 2: last sort of seventy eighty years or so, this sort
50:31
Speaker 2: of migration away from organized religions in a lot of
50:35
Speaker 2: places that we are finding and studies are finding that
50:40
Speaker 2: there is this distinct sense of a lot of meaning.
50:43
Speaker 2: And we've we come across this all the time. I
50:45
Speaker 2: mean I come across all the time, people coming along
50:47
Speaker 2: looking for mentoring sessions or whatnot, because weally don't understand
50:52
Speaker 2: what is my purpose on this planet? Like what am
50:55
Speaker 2: I doing here besides consuming natural resources?
50:59
Speaker 3: You know?
50:59
Speaker 2: And there is that feeling of what is purpose? And
51:03
Speaker 2: I think when we start getting into and that's been
51:06
Speaker 2: the message of all of the work in the spectral
51:09
Speaker 2: literature that I've been looking at, is this feeling of
51:14
Speaker 2: what is my purpose here? What can I do here
51:17
Speaker 2: that makes a contribution? Where is their meaning in me
51:20
Speaker 2: being here at all? But even in asking those questions, Victor,
51:23
Speaker 2: there is meaning. I mean, the fact that we're even
51:25
Speaker 2: asking what can I do here to make life meaningful?
51:29
Speaker 2: What can I do here to give myself a sense
51:31
Speaker 2: of purpose? Means you're looking to contribute in some way
51:35
Speaker 2: to the existence here. It's not about sort of taking,
51:39
Speaker 2: it's all, Oh, it's all about me and here's my playground? Well,
51:42
Speaker 2: all I think, and this has been the lesson. This
51:44
Speaker 2: is the lesson of this literature. This was The lesson
51:46
Speaker 2: that Victor Frankel talked about is that ultimate meaning comes
51:52
Speaker 2: from finding purpose in serving and helping other people, and
51:59
Speaker 2: that it doesn't have people could be animals, any beings,
52:01
Speaker 2: can be the planet. But it's really about thinking beyond
52:05
Speaker 2: the self. So I think, but that's what comes up
52:09
Speaker 2: a lot in this literature, and I think it's become
52:11
Speaker 2: more important these days, especially as there's been this sort
52:15
Speaker 2: of drift away from organized religion where we're actually having
52:18
Speaker 2: to navigate our way by ourselves, that that becomes the
52:22
Speaker 2: core tenet of what gives life meaning because I think,
52:26
Speaker 2: you know, we say, oh, God, the world's harbor place.
52:29
Speaker 2: People do terrible things to each other, and that is true,
52:32
Speaker 2: but people also on a daily basis do very positive,
52:37
Speaker 2: uplifting things for each other too, which is why even
52:40
Speaker 2: if you go to social media, the Good Newsgirl, for example,
52:44
Speaker 2: millions of followers, because people are uplifted to see demonstrations
52:50
Speaker 2: and examples of human kindness. I think that's our natural
52:53
Speaker 2: space is not to be grabbing and commercial and trying
52:57
Speaker 2: to get this and trying to get that and trying
52:58
Speaker 2: to survive. I think our natural disposition is towards human kindness.
53:04
Speaker 2: And when we can actually take away things like the
53:06
Speaker 2: fear of death that sort of makes us survival instinct
53:09
Speaker 2: kick in. That's going to make us, you know, climb
53:11
Speaker 2: all overy people to get to the last bag of
53:13
Speaker 2: eyes on this, on this, you know, on the shelf,
53:15
Speaker 2: in in the middle of a catastrophe. I think when
53:18
Speaker 2: we start recognizing that our natural state of being is
53:25
Speaker 2: connection and is kindness and is wanting to perform acts
53:31
Speaker 2: of kindness in trying to do things that are useful
53:35
Speaker 2: that can help somebody else, when we realize that, and
53:39
Speaker 2: I think that's what the literature is showing, and I
53:40
Speaker 2: think that's what our post secular kinnterculture is showing. That
53:44
Speaker 2: that's just what's what is giving life meaning. I mean,
53:47
Speaker 2: even if you think about it yourself, if you go
53:49
Speaker 2: out and you find somebody in distress and you're able
53:52
Speaker 2: to actually do something to help them, that stays with you,
53:57
Speaker 2: That kindness stays with you. And I think we're all
54:00
Speaker 2: like that. And I feel like we're in a society
54:03
Speaker 2: where there becomes so much negativity and so much hate
54:06
Speaker 2: and so much criticism and all the rest of it
54:10
Speaker 2: is that it's really important to remember that the human
54:13
Speaker 2: condition is inherently one that really strives towards kindness.
54:20
Speaker 1: And as I learned when I attended the Interfaith New
54:23
Speaker 1: Seminary in New York in the late nineteen nineties, there
54:27
Speaker 1: is virtually an iteration of the Golden Rule in every
54:31
Speaker 1: faith around the world, and every religion. Do unto others
54:34
Speaker 1: as you'd have them doing to you, Love thy neighbor
54:36
Speaker 1: as thyself. If we all did that, what a world
54:39
Speaker 1: this would be?
54:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, And I do believe that that is not
54:42
Speaker 2: even sort of like an unnatural thing. I think that's
54:45
Speaker 2: a very very natural thing. That's the sort of thing
54:48
Speaker 2: we actually want to do. We want to be able
54:51
Speaker 2: to tell people, and I know some people can make
54:54
Speaker 2: it very difficult and it can be quite challenging, but
54:57
Speaker 2: I think that's part of our purpose here, is to
55:00
Speaker 2: be able to not just to help the people were
55:02
Speaker 2: nice to us, but help the hurt people, because you know,
55:05
Speaker 2: the hurt people are the ones who hurt, so they
55:07
Speaker 2: can be the most difficult ones to help, but they're
55:09
Speaker 2: also the ones most desperately needed.
55:12
Speaker 1: The wisdom of my guest doctor Karen Francis McCarthy. We've
55:15
Speaker 1: been talking about her dissertation The re enchanted ghost spectral
55:20
Speaker 1: literature in twenty first century America. Karen, one more time,
55:23
Speaker 1: please share with our listeners where they can find out
55:25
Speaker 1: more about you and your amazing work.
55:27
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, please just go along to my website Karen
55:30
Speaker 2: Francis McCarthy dot com. That's Francis with an E, and
55:34
Speaker 2: there's lots of links off There's lots of information on
55:36
Speaker 2: the site. We've got a free community there, lots of
55:38
Speaker 2: resources and then a lot of links offers to upcoming classes,
55:43
Speaker 2: to private sessions, to mentoring to our community groups. So
55:47
Speaker 2: this sort of lots there, So I would encourage anybody
55:49
Speaker 2: to pop along there and see if anything that is
55:52
Speaker 2: there resonates. And hopefully there's quite a lot of talks,
55:56
Speaker 2: there's guided meditations, and all of this content is free,
55:59
Speaker 2: so hope you'll find something there that resonates and helps you.
56:03
Speaker 1: And doctor Karen. Congratulations once again.
56:06
Speaker 2: Thank you, Victor, thanks very much, and.
56:09
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us on Destination Unlimited. I'm Victor
56:13
Speaker 1: the Boyce Furman. Have a wonderful week.