December 1, 2024 • 50 mins
Join Sandra and discover the bedside shared-death experiences of Helen Gretchen Jones.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
And you're here.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Thanks for choosing the iHeartRadio and Coast to Ghost Day
and Paranormal Podcast Network. Your quest for podcasts of the paranormal, supernatural,
and the unexplained ends here. We invite you to enjoy
all our shows we have on this network, and right now,
let's start with Chase of the Afterlife with the Sandra Champlain.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Welcome to our podcast. Please be aware the thoughts and
opinions expressed by the host are their thoughts and opinions
only and do not reflect those of iHeartMedia, iHeartRadio, Coast
to Coast, am employees of Premiere Networks, or their sponsors
and associates. We would like to encourage you to do
(00:42):
your own research and discover the subject matter for yourself. Hi,
I'm Sandra Champlain. For over twenty five years, I've been
on a journey to prove the existence of life after death.
On each episode, we'll decid us the reasons we now
know that our loved ones have survived physical death and
(01:05):
so will we. Welcome to Shades of the Afterlife. We
were first introduced to the topic of shared deaf experiences
back on episode twenty three, talking to William Peters, who
runs the Shared Crossing Project. You may also remember talking
to doctor Raymond Moody and co author Paul Perry about
(01:27):
their latest book on shared deaf experiences back on episode
one fifty one. Today we'll continue our look at shared
death experiences as we meet Helen Gretchen Jones. By day,
she and her husband run a photography, film and lighting
company in Austin, Texas. She's also a mom and a
(01:48):
death doula, having volunteered hundreds of hours by the bedside
of those passing with an organization called NODA, which stands
for No One Dies Alone. As a child, Gretchen had
a special relationship with wise voices who would talk to her,
and attributes that to spending much time alone and what
(02:09):
we now call a meditative state. I ask that while
you listen today, you engage your own imagination as she
tells you some of her stories. Gretchen has recently written
a book called Healing Whispers from Spirit Guides, bridging the
gap between life and the afterlife with a death Dula's Wisdom.
(02:29):
I first met Gretchen six or seven years ago at
a medium workshop in New Orleans. She's a kind and
beautiful soul for sure, and be sure to listen to
the end. She's got some great advice and what we
can all do to slow down and bridge the two worlds.
Here's Gretchen.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
I am in Central Texas and I am married with
a couple of kids, but I do death doula work,
which is a little outside of social norms. A death
doula is someone who holistically helped someone transitioned to the
other side. I think it's a growing need with the
changing shifts in our healthcare system. A lot of times
(03:09):
nurses used to be able to have the time to
sit bedside, and now they have so much red tape
and paperwork. It's very helpful now to have someone else
that can come in and sit beside people who are transitioning.
And I think that's where the death doula can come
in and really help there. And so it's one of
my favorite things that I get to do, and I
am just so honored to be able to sit bedside
(03:31):
with some of these patients.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
How did you first get involved in that, because it's
not the average person that says, gee, i'd like to
do this.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Well, I've always had a connection with spirit my whole life,
so that has always been a natural part of my
own perspective of the world. But in twenty fifteen, my
father transitioned and it was unexpected for a lot of
people in my family. He had Cross of the liver
and he was only in his fifties, so it sort
(03:59):
of took the family by surprise. There wasn't closure, and
a lot of people had a lot of unsaid things,
especially my sisters, around his death, and it just made
me think, Wow, if there was a way that I
could sit with families and help them find closure, find
peace before their loved one transitions so that other families
don't have to experience what my family did, or if
(04:20):
there was a way to help people to transition so
they don't feel that fear around death, that would also
be something I would like to be a part of.
And through a series of their indipitous events, I came
across certification as a death duela and I just dove
right in and I haven't looked back since.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
Those first days must have been tough, you know, we
have that feeling that we want to do something, and
I know there's a lot of joy within hospice, but
you also get to know people and then they.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Depart, so with hospice. That's where it is the hardest,
because you do form those relationships with loved ones. They
become your family. Sometimes I've had patients last as long
as five years on hospice. I also volunteer with NOA,
which is a no one Dies Alone program, and in
that situation, you only know these people for one to
three days typically, so it's a much shorter time. But
(05:11):
at first I thought I really needed to be the
strong one. I needed to not cry, I needed to
have the answers, I needed to have it all together
whenever I sat with these people and their families. But
that really takes a toll on you because it is
an emotional situation that you're sitting in. Once I allowed
myself to be free to experience exactly what I was
experiencing in the moment, and I do tear up with
(05:33):
every one of my patients. It made not only the patient,
but the family feels safe to be vulnerable. Also. They
all break down and then they say what they need
to say. They find that strength within themselves to say
those final words that maybe they're holding up. They don't
want to appear weak or as a burden often and
so they hold it all in. But if one person
(05:53):
breaks down, then everybody else starts to and it's the
most beautiful thing to unfold. So long apply that resistance,
trying to be the strong one, I allow what is
to just happen, and it's amazing how everyone seems to
open up. It's also important to note that the fear
around death is often just after and before we are
diagnosed with the terminal illness. The fear seems to go
(06:16):
away in that final week. There seems to be a
shift as that person moves into two worlds at once.
They start to see things and they start to have
moments of peace and moments of hey, maybe it's not
so scary after all. And it's the family who hangs
on to this fear around death while the other person
is moving into accepting it and recognizing loved ones at
(06:39):
the bedside. So the fear is what we put on
ourselves before death and when we first receive eterminal illness.
But when we actually start the process of transitioning, that
fear releases, and it really is beautiful. So I have
witnessed people standing outside their bodies, other beings of light, angelics,
other family members. I've actually had shared experiences where I
(07:01):
go part way into the spirit world with some of
my clients and patients. I'm a believer, but I'm absolutely
open to it, which is I think why some of
these experiences are happening so frequently for me. It's actually
maybe too why I'm a death doula, because there's such
a moment of joy that I get to experience at
the bedside, so it doesn't fill me with all this
sadness the way maybe some other people might perceive it.
(07:22):
It's glorious. I would say. One story that I'm really
enjoying sharing right now is a story about Missus Wilma.
And Missus Wilma was on the NODA program. When you
volunteer with NOTA they send out an email just like
an email blast to everybody, and you fill up a
time slot in three hour time shifts. I signed up.
I went down to the hospital and sat with Missus Wilma,
(07:45):
and on my way there, I knew that I was
going to be visiting an elderly woman, and I knew
that she had family, but that her family wouldn't be
able to make it in. When I got there, that
was validated, and I think the reason spirit gives me
that information. They give me off times a age or
a race or a gender is just so that when
I arrivee and it's validated, I know that I'm tuned
(08:06):
into spirit. So I think that's why they give it
to me. So I knew when I showed up there
she was, it was validated. And I sit down. She
looks so peaceful already, and I start my own little
ritual of like prayer and intention, and I place my
hands on her hand, and out of the corner of
my eye, I see a little girl walk in. And
then it occurred to me. She was in black and white.
(08:29):
It's a younger version of Missus Wilma. She's probably twelve
or thirteen years old. She's wearing her Sunday best. She's,
you know, got her hair twisted in little pigtails. And
she walks over to me and takes my right hand.
My left hand is holding elderly Missus Wilma's hand. When
(08:49):
this happens, the entire hospital room transforms into this forest.
So I am aware that I am in two worlds
at once. I'm very much aware that I am observing
elderly missus Wilma in the hospital room. I'm aware of
the navy blue chair that I am sitting in, and
then I'm simultaneously aware of standing in this forest holding
(09:10):
young Missus Wilma's hand, and I had this amazing feeling
that I was bigger than my body, bigger and free,
this amazing feeling of freedom. If you put me in
a bigger room, I would have been bigger than that room.
It was just the most glorious feeling. And then I
had this knowing that there was an overarching theme in
(09:31):
Missus Wilma's life where separation was the main part of
one of her big lessons or experiences she wanted to have.
So in her childhood there was a whole lot of segregation.
She lived through that, and then now in death she's
dying without her family, so separated again, and so this
was a big part of her learning experience. So as
(09:52):
we're standing in this forest, she tells me, we're going
to climb this tree. Young Missus Wilma does and just
by thinking about it, We're at the top of the
t and I can see full three sixty even though
I'm just staring straight ahead, and she tells me that
this tree is a life. But if we look more closely.
Every single root on this tree is a life. Every
(10:13):
single root that branches off of another roof is its
own little life. Every branch is its own life, every
branch branching off that branch is its own life. Every
single leaf is its own life. And yet it's all connected,
and it's all in service to the greater whole of
this tree. And then if we pull back even further,
this tree is not just one life. It's part of
(10:35):
this whole forest. And if we pull back even further,
this forest is part of an entire ecosystem. And it
was as though she had this final moment and a
student to teach that we aren't separate, that we are
all connected, even though we perceive ourselves to have all
individual lives. And so in this last final moments of
(10:55):
her life, she took the opportunity to teach from her
experience of separation and segregation to teach this moment of
unity and connection of all things. So that was one
of my favorite experiences. And as she took her final breath,
I'm holding her hand with my left hand in the hospital,
and missus Wilma's holding my right hand, and it was
(11:16):
just this glorious moment of just unity and it was
so beautiful.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
Thank you for sharing that. Now, it's not the average
person that might pick up on that. So I want
to get into some of your beliefs about the afterlife.
I know you've been trained as a medium, intuitive hypnosis, reikie,
past life regressions, theology. There's a lot to you. So
to everyone who's listening right now, you just didn't walk
(11:43):
in and ooh all these things happened. You're open to it.
Do you want to talk a little bit about your
history and how you first started believing in a bigger picture,
believing in the afterlife, believing in the soul. When I
was very little, I would hear a voice. And I
could be four or five, we're talking very.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Very young, and the voice was very helpful, and it
was always guiding me. I just assumed everyone heard this
voice or had this voice. The voice was sometimes masculine,
sometimes feminine, but it always came from the same place somehow.
When I would get overwhelmed as a little girl, I
would go sit in an empty bathtub, close the bathroom door,
and I would just focus on the silence, and sometimes
(12:22):
the voice would find me. In those moments of silence
and sometimes not. My family was not religious, nobody practiced anything.
They weren't spiritual.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
E there.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
What I know I was doing now was the form
of meditation, but my family would not have known what
that was even then. It was just something I was doing.
When I would see spirit and I would share that
with my family, it was dismissed. My dad used to say,
I believe you believe that's what you saw. The experiences
with spirit were so beautiful and so comforting and so transformative.
(12:52):
I never questioned if they were real.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
We need to take a quick break and we'll be
right back with Gretchen Jones. You're listening to of the
Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast, a m
paranormal podcast network. Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.
(13:28):
I'm Sandra Champlain and we're here with Helen Gretchen Jones,
a death doula, and she was just sharing about being
a little child and hearing the most beautiful voices when
her mind was quiet. Let's continue.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
The experiences with spirit were so beautiful and so comforting
and so transformative. I never questioned if they were real,
but it did make me question the wisdom of my parents,
if I could trust their teachings, because it didn't make
me think, oh, I must have imagined that, because I
knew it was real, I thought, oh, are they not
experience that? And then I started being more mindful over
(14:03):
who I shared those experiences with. Once I went to
college and graduated, went to grad school, got married, had kids,
I really put this on the back burner. I focused
on all the amazing things that this physical life had
to offer, and I was going full force. I did
not want to take time for any kind of spiritual stuff.
But my team and spirit started coming around and started
(14:25):
wanting me to focus on compassion. I think one of
the things when we're really young children, teenager, and even
into our early adulthood, were so self focused because we
have to for survival. We have to learn what our
family wants so that we can be accepted, and then
we change who we are so we can fit into
that family, and then we do that with our friends
through middle school and high school, and then in college
(14:47):
you're starting out and you're like, who am I as
a young adult, so you're still so self focused, and
my team and spirit decided it was time for me
to move from that self focused attitude and move into
a more compassionate way of viewing the world. And they
would always remind me put yourself in their shoes, not
how you would do something different, not to try to
fix your circumstance, but just put yourself in their shoes.
(15:09):
And that's it. Trying to help me understand what someone
else was going through. And so, with the help of
who I call a team, my team and spirit, I
started allowing their teachings to change my perspectives around life.
But I've always had a spiritual connection. I even studied
in college art history and theology. I was looking for
(15:29):
the answers like if my parents didn't have them, who
would I had to be out there, And the more
research I did, the more questions I had over and over.
And I think that the most important thing that we
can all do, where we can all start is by
turning inward and trusting our own connection to our own
higher self or spirit or God or universe energy, whatever
(15:50):
word works for you, it's all the same, really, So
if we're tuning into that, we can start to navigate
our own challenges with a little more grace and peace
by connecting to what we can trust absolutely.
Speaker 4 (16:03):
When did reiki and mediumship come into the picture. It
all happened really so fast. I had this idea after
I became a death dealer that I would help out
with green funerals and green burials and things like that.
And I thought I was going to something like that,
like a conference, and I actually found myself at a conference.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
It was a bunch of mediums. They were there, and
I'm like, where am I? I thought I was at
this funeral thing. And then I started thinking, well, mediumship
and then I hear people doing reiki. Right after that,
I was taking that mediumship workshop in Louisiana where we
first met, and it just unfolded all so quickly, and
I just was so thirsty for as much knowledge as
I could get. I started taking courses and everything because
(16:43):
I wanted to know more. So I got certified and
everything as quickly as I could.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
I'm ever so proud to have that first conversation in
Louisiana to where you are today. I know you just
put the book out, which is fantastic. Congratulations. It is
a labor of love. It was tell us about it,
what can we find? What is it about? And maybe
some stories from your book.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
Sure. So a few years ago, I was laying in
bed and I heard a voice outside. So normally I
hear the voice of my team and spirit inside my head.
This one came right in front of my face from
outside my head, and it said, you're going to write
a book. And I was like, write a book? Are
you sure?
Speaker 5 (17:24):
Like?
Speaker 1 (17:25):
I don't feel qualified. Surely, I didn't have anything worth
saying that someone would want to read. That was sort
of my idea, and they said it will take two
and a half years to complete and write. What you know,
I didn't know what to write about, had no idea.
What do I know? I know a little about a
lot of things, but I didn't feel like an expert
in any one field. And then it did occur to
(17:45):
me that my favorite thing that was happening were the
transformative bedside experiences of my patients. And I'd already journaled
all the experiences I'm having, and so I referred to
those journals and compiled them my favorite ones into this book.
Every other chapter is one of my patient stories, and
the preceding chapter is something that I've learned from Spirit
and something that I've learned through the process of working
(18:06):
with spirit and people who are dying, and then I
would put a relatable story of one of my patients
as they transitioned. So it's really a teaching book and
then beautiful stories. I end every chapter with a channeled
message from my team and spirit a team, so it's
this kind of compilation of all the beautiful things happening.
(18:27):
I can share one story that's a little out there,
but it is one that happened fairly recently. It is
one that I'm hoping will happen more times for me.
I was out late, later than I normally am, and
I see on my email that there's a request for
a note of visit. I had a feeling that I
should be there for this person, but it was already
(18:48):
so late. It was after midnight. I was so tired.
I just wanted to go to bed. But I looked
on the schedule to see what timeslots were available, and
although I did see there was a six am shift
and that was just a few hours away. But I thought, Okay,
if I'm supposed to be there, guys, I'm talking to
my team in spirit. If I'm supposed to be there,
you guys are going to have to wake me up.
I'm not sitting in alarm, and it's going to have
to be like at four point thirty for me to
(19:09):
get ready in time and get down there. At four
twenty eight, I wake up and I have the song
playing in my head. It's called Colors by the Black Pumas.
The song lyrics are talking about the meadows of green
and the trees and the blue skies, and I'm like, oh,
this is going to be relevant somehow, and I look
at the clock. I'm like, all right, guys, I'm signing up.
I hop in the car, so I drive into the
hospital and I turn on the radio. Colors by the
(19:31):
Black Pumas is playing again, and I'm just like, oh,
this is going to be a thing, okay, And I
have a sudden realization that my patient will be male,
he will be having issues around anxiety, and he would
be black.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Well.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
At that time, I was having panic attacks. They came
out of nowhere. They were really, really scary if you
haven't had them. And I was a little worried about
that anxiety because sometimes I feel like if I watch
it, it might trigger one. So I was like, Okay, let's
see what's going to happen. I get there and mister Virgil,
he is male, he is black, and he is having
(20:06):
panic attacks over and over, ninety seconds of peace followed
by like thirty seconds of panic. So it was hard
to watch if you are unaware of the spiritual aspect
happening bedside and you're just focused on the physical. So
I sit down with him, I put my hands on him,
trying to bring him peace, and when I realized that
(20:27):
wasn't working, I decided to connect to him more on
the spiritual level. And as I did, once again, the
hospital room transformed into the most beautiful scene that you
can imagine. It was a green meadow. There were all
these big, bright flowers. They were bigger and brighter than
any flower that I've ever seen on earth. And there
(20:50):
was like a forest straight ahead and off to the
right a little bit, and everything emanated light from within
every blade of grass, every flower, every tree. It's like
light came out of it. And everything had a sound.
It was as though it had a humming or a
tone of some sort. I really can't explain it, but
it was musical. Didn't have a beat, but there was
(21:11):
this music somehow out of every single thing, and it
was just glorious, and I recognize that I'm standing in
this field right next to mister Virgil. So again I
have this awareness that I am sitting bedside mister Virgil
in the hospital, holding his hand. And also mister Virgil
and I are standing together in this magnificent field of
(21:34):
light and color and sound, and I know that we
have to walk through the forest as part of our journey.
I can hear a party happening over there, and this
is very, very common. There's always a welcome home party
that's happening for our loved ones, and these can vary
from small picnics in a park to something grand in
some kind of ballroom. And it's always fun to see
(21:56):
which kind of party my patient's going to be having,
because it gives me a lot of insight to who
they are or what they like that maybe I didn't
realize in their physical life. So we start walking towards
the forest, and all of a sudden, I feel mister
Virgil have just a real rush of apprehension. Fear comes
through him, and he didn't want to enter the forest.
It's like he knew once he entered and went into
(22:18):
that welcome home party, which I can see his mom
at I don't know what seemed final for him. So
just then a being of light comes out of the
forest and she is blue and white light, and she
is absolutely gorgeous and just peace rushes over you when
you see her. And it was me. I was the
being of light. I don't know how now I am
(22:39):
in three places at once. This is the only time
this has ever happened. But we are multi dimensional beings
after all, and so I'm thinking that this is how
this all relates. I am physically in the room with
mister Virgil as his body is shutting down. I am
observing all of this happening from the field of flowers
with mister Virgil, and I'm also the me of light
coming from the forest to aid him through his journey
(23:02):
through the forest. So it was and continues to be
the most astounding experience so far as he's having all
this apprehension, I bring a gift out of I don't
know nowhere. I resent him with a small gift, and
it's a little box wrapped in a purple ribbon, and
I explained to him that this is his gift of life,
(23:22):
and that inside this little box is every experience he
has ever had, as mister Virgil, and he's like, I
don't think I can go in there to the forest
because I have sinned and I have so many things
that I'm regretful of and things I shouldn't have done. I,
the me of Light, had this unconditional love for him,
an unconditional love I have never felt before. I love unconditionally,
(23:46):
but this was different. It didn't matter what he did,
it didn't matter who he was, it didn't matter any
of that. I loved him so much. It just was
all in this box, like it was just experience and
that was it. There was no judgment at all. I've
projected somehow that he was safe and that he was loved,
and nothing like that mattered. And he agreed to enter
(24:08):
the forest, and so he goes with the Mea of Light.
The other Mee stays in the field of flowers, and
yet I'm watching, somehow observing them as they walk through
the forest, and I'm also present as the Mea of Light,
very much aware of walking with him through the forest.
Suddenly again he has this wave of fear come over him,
and I get really really big, the Mea of Light does,
(24:31):
and I scoop him up like he's a baby, and
I hold him and I rock him and I kiss
the top of his head, and the entire forest I
don't know fades away and it becomes a backdrop of stars,
and it's like we're in space somehow, and I'm holding
him until he felt ready again to go on the trip,
and then I put him back down. We're back in
the forest and we continue our journey. As we get
(24:55):
to the edge of the forest, we can see the
party and he decides he's not re ready to go
in yet and wants to sit down. Oh one more
thing I forgot to mention. He asks the Me of
Light what's going to happen to my nephew and my uncle?
And the Me of Light rejects to him potential possibilities
and outcomes for both of these people. But when that happens,
(25:19):
my awareness wouldn't let me see what was being projected
as the Me of light. It shot back to the
observer in the field.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back.
You're listening to Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio
and Coast to Coast am Pironormal Podcast Network. Welcome back
(25:55):
to Shades of the Afterlife. I'm Sandra Champlain, and you're
listening to how Gretchen Jones talking about a patient she
was with before he passed, mister Virgil comforting him in
the share death experience of a forest.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
He sat on the log and he decided you needed
a minute to take time before he went into the
welcome party where his mom was waiting and other people.
Just then a nurse comes in and I all of
a sudden shoot back to my physical self, and she's
chatting about the bachelorette party she's about to go to
for the weekend and get in his vitals, and I
just thought it was so funny. She's interrupting at homecoming
(26:32):
party talking about the bachelorette party, and it was just
so interesting and how everything was just all connected. She
has no idea that she's left him about to transition
right there on the edge of the forest, or that
I was in three worlds at once, all at one time.
It was time for me to leave on that shift,
and I really wanted to stay. That the next volunteer
(26:53):
had shown up, and so I allowed them to stay.
And as I was leaving, that's when mister Virgil finally
walked into the welcome home party. But it was one
of the most profound experiences I've ever had. I'm looking
forward to having more of those.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Incredible. So you're saying that's when he passed just shortly after, Yes,
probably at peace. Wow, So you experienced these And if
I was a skeptic, I would say those all sound
great that you experience them, But have you received any
verified information. I don't not believe you, because I do.
I think we are multi dimensional beings. I've heard just
(27:29):
some incredible stories and when we slow down, when we
study psychic and mediumship and explore what's possible, I know
your real gift to people as a death duela. But
if there was somebody skeptical saying, well, these are your experiences,
how do we know.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
So for a lot of people, unless they're having a
near death experience where they can come back and verify,
if they're all the way transitioning, then it's very difficult
to prove. But I can say that these people have
similar experiences even with people not who are dying, but
who have Alzheimer's dementia or a condition at birth that
kept them from being nonverbal. So even if they're not transitioning,
(28:10):
yet they step out of their bodies very very frequently.
And I have been able to work with families through
some of these situations, and when I explain something like, hey,
they're telling me this, or hey, they're telling me that
through Alzheimer's or dementia, or even one case which I
haven't written about, will call him Eric. Eric is a
(28:31):
male in his twenties. He's quadriplegic, and at two years
old he developed a condition that made him nonverbal. His
mother hired me because they were told that he was
probably going to be transitioning soon. So I was coming
in to sort of be a death duela for the
family and for him. And I would like to say
(28:51):
he's still going, he's still here as of now, but
because he's nonverbal, there's been some situations with the family
where family has different ideas of how they want to
proceed with him. And so he was able to very
clearly tell me certain things that were uncomfortable, that were
causing pain. I relayed this information to the family because
(29:14):
he's standing outside his body, He's right there, and I
tell this to the family and they're like, no, no,
that doesn't make sense, No, that doesn't make sense, and
I'm just like, Okay. Well, she calls me a few
days later, she goes, well, we went ahead and took
him into the doctor just in case, and you're right,
he had this going on with his body on that side.
He had this going on with that body. And I'm
just like, yeah, because he's saying it, he's standing outside
(29:34):
his body. He's right there. So without giving away his help,
I haven't thought how to word some of this because
of the privacy of the family and the fact that
they're still around. But the fact that they had no
idea this was going on within their son's body or
their brother's body, and then it was validated a few
days later when they decided just to go check it
out at the hospital was very validating to the fact
(29:57):
that he was communicating very clearly and very fac actively.
He had some other things that he wanted to negotiate
with the families on how relationships were unfolding with them
and how his purpose has been in one way or
another to unify the family, and he feels like it's
difficult for him to move on with everyone fighting over
how he should be moving on. So a lot of
(30:19):
that got resolved after they had it validated, and so
that was very helpful and healing. So even people who
aren't dying who later can have the evidence validated is
really really helpful. When I'm helping someone transition, I'm really
focused on how to make that transition more peaceful and
embracing all of the spiritual and physical experiences that go
(30:41):
along with that. So for me, it's very very real.
And I have dealt with many families who don't maybe
believe in this type of situation, and so it's not
my job to convert them. Why would I ever want
to know, But it is my job to bring peace,
and so we can navigate or maybe shift how we
(31:01):
were things so that it brings peace to the family
as well.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Thanks for sharing that. Yeah, it's so difficult. There could
be so much family baggage. And you and I both
have done our share of psychic and medium work, and
the stuff that we think is our imagination. When it
gets confirmed and it's not, you just think, oh my gosh,
you know, how can this be? And so to be
that and be that for the dying person, whether or
(31:26):
not someone believes, And it isn't your job to try
to convince someone. Can you talk about the welcoming as
a dying person, what might tend to happen, whether we
believe or not believe.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
Sure, in every case that I've experienced so far, there
has been a welcome party of sorts, and there's music,
there's decorations, there's loved ones, even people maybe that we
loved that we didn't have in this physical life. We
know them from another time in space. So there's all
sorts of people congregating to welcome you home. You're the
(32:01):
guest of honor. The amount of excitement that I feel
is more excitement than I have felt at any surprise
party or at any gathering. It is overwhelming. It's so joyous.
My grandmother when she transitioned, she was giving her team
in spirit where she was talking to her loved ones
who went before her. She was telling them exactly what
(32:22):
she wanted. She was always in control. She planned events
and parties for our families. So she was very much
into event planning, and so she was telling them exactly
what she wanted before she died. She's like, all right, guys,
when I get over there, I'm going to want to
be on a golf course. So when I go over there,
so she wanted it to be at the country club.
She wanted it to be casual, she wanted everybody there.
(32:43):
She was talking about every way she can plan it.
So she was planning her own homecoming party. My other
grandmother was completely different. She had a little bit of
fear around dying. And her welcome home party was something
I hadn't seen. But my grandfather was sitting outside of
a dela livery room in a hospital and she was
going to be delivered into the other world. And back then,
(33:07):
men weren't allowed in the delivery room, so he was
waiting outside the door. So that's how it was. He
was waiting for her to be delivered into this world.
And down the hallway, just a couple of doors down
was this all white, bright room that was so bright
it was just light and all of these people. I
saw him open the door and tell everybody it's time.
And when he did that, I could see some of
(33:27):
her children, I could see some of her siblings. I
saw people that I didn't even recognize, and they were
all just anticipating just the best time with her. And
it was as though it was in a delivery room.
So what an unusual party, But it was something that
sort of suited that grandmother. It was like being rebirthed
into something, and so that worked for her, whereas my
(33:49):
other grandmother throwing parties for all her life and very controlling.
She was telling people what she wanted. When she transitioned
and she got it, she was there, she was wearing
a visor, just like she would play on the golf course.
So these welcome parties, it's a way to have someone
feel loved. It's a way to have someone feel that
they're not alone and that this world is not so
(34:10):
different than where we're coming from, but it's filled with
so much more. I don't know. Just beauty and grace
and understanding and freedom is what it feels like. Expansiveness
We as human beings, we'll never get our heads around
how glorious. The next stage is our returning home. I'll
(34:30):
put it that way. I think we're here just for
a short time and we go back and like we
welcome a.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Baby to this world. I mean, it's a grand celebration
and then a death. Although many cultures do celebrate death
our Central and South American countries and others here, I
know it's fear and I don't want to go and
to have loved ones show up. And I've heard many,
(34:58):
many stories of people who verbalized who they see and
how they see them, and so often they might not
even know somebody's deceased, and there they are, and that
feeling of just like I'm going home, you know. So
I get it, that rebirth, that big celebration that we're
back together again. And I remember my grandmother before she
(35:20):
passed one week short of her ninety first birthday, and
everybody in her life had died, all of her friends
and husband and almost all brothers and sisters. So she
wasn't afraid. And she says, when God calls me forth,
I can't come fifth. That was her line.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
But just getting that reunion.
Speaker 3 (35:41):
And I've lived a good life and now I'm ready
to go home. I'm ready to see everybody again. And
I have full one hundred percent confidence that that's how
goes and there and then we get to like, go,
oh my gosh, that life will make this life here
seem like just a dream.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Yes, yes, absolutely, And when I'm in the other space
in between walking with people to their parties, for example,
it feels so much more real than when I come
back to this reality. This reality feels confined or restricted
somehow than when I'm there, and I know that I'm
not even experiencing all of it, just a little snippet,
(36:19):
but it's so much bigger and brighter, and the light
and the sound everything is just somehow more amazing and
more intense than it is here here. I feel not trapped,
that's not a good word. I want to be here,
but limited a little bit. And we aren't limited. We
are limitless, and we are perceived limited I think by
our brains that kind of shut out some of our
(36:40):
otherworldly experiences that are happening right here with us right now.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
If you're having these experiences, tells me other people can
have these experiences.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
Yeah, how can we begin now?
Speaker 3 (36:52):
I know not everybody wants to be a death doula,
or maybe this will open the door for some volunteers
with NODA no one dies alone. Wouldn't that be great
coming out of this great episode? But how do we start?
Is it meditation? Is it being present? Is it a prayer?
What advice would you give all of that?
Speaker 1 (37:14):
So meditation often comes with a little bit of apprehension
for some people who just absolutely say I cannot meditate,
and so I sometimes say, well, then, don't call it meditation, right,
call it sitting in silence or closing your eyes is
really helpful to remove some of those distractions in your
physical reality.
Speaker 3 (37:31):
I would say start now. I'm going to pause right now,
because in the next segment Gretchen will go on in
even more detail about how we can each slow down
connect with our imagination, which, as it proves, may not
be our imagination to our loved ones in the shared
(37:52):
death experience. So we'll be right back. You're listening to
Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to
Coast and Paranormal Podcast Network. Welcome back to Shades of
(38:22):
the Afterlife. I'm Sandra Champlain and we're here with Helen
Gretchen Jones. As she's just beginning to explain how we
can each tap in to the other side and possibly
have a shared experience.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
Sitting in silence or closing your eyes is really helpful
to remove some of those distractions in your physical reality.
I would say start now, Start now. Don't wait until
someone's dying. But if you are already in a position
where someone has been diagnosed with the terminal illness, again,
start now and take time every day and just sit
for a few minutes. It doesn't have to be some
(38:55):
overthought process. Just sit quietly for a few minutes, say,
set an intention, whatever feels right for you, talk to God, universe, angels,
whatever again feels right for you, and you just say, hey, guys,
I would like to have a shared death experience. Now
I'm going to sit quietly and if you can help
me practice receiving information so that when the time comes,
(39:16):
I can have one and then write it down. I
cannot stress that enough write it down, because you will forget.
And if you go back and you were to do this,
even for ten days straight, and you go back and
look at day one and then you look at day ten,
you're going to be like, I think I'm discerning these
messages a little more now than I was when I
first started, even just in a short time like that,
(39:39):
because at first you start to think, am I making
this up? Everything feels made up? And you know what
I say to that, I say, make it up because
this world is co created and we are all co
creating it together, and your imagination is part of creation.
It's part of how we create things. So if you're
feeling like you just want to explore what your imagination
can do visually. That's an excellent way to open the
(39:59):
door to spirit leading you to impressions. Absolutely feel like
you're making it up. Go for it, and this is
a good way to start. And then when you allow
yourself to move past that a little bit, you'll start
to have discernment over what is actually coming in as
an impression from spirit and what you're creating. A good
way to tell is if you're creating it, you take
(40:20):
time in your head to kind of think about what
you want to create. I want to see a blue sky,
I want to see a waterfall. Now, if it's being
given to you, all of a sudden, you just see
blue sky, waterfall, green meadow. It all comes in super
fast like a download, bam. The more you practice, the
more you start to recognize what's made up and what's not.
(40:40):
And even someone who's been doing this a long time,
I've been doing it for several years now. And just
like when Eric's family told me, no, that's not right,
I left feeling a little defeated, like how did I
mess this up? I really missed the mark here, and
I felt like I had failed the family, And so
I was really grateful when they called back a few
days later to validate those things coming through. So even
(41:01):
people who are doing it all the time feel like,
am I making this up? Did I interpret that message correctly?
That's part of it. That's okay. Allow yourself to experience,
and as you practice that, when the opportunity comes for
a shared death experience, you're already open to spirit. You've
already learned what it feels like to allow the outside
distractions to fall away, and you can be open to
(41:23):
what comes through. So I would say practice solitude and
writing it down good words.
Speaker 3 (41:30):
I was on an interview earlier this morning. Somebody was
interviewing me and I talked about my first medium experience
and I was one hundred percent accurate with names, places, everything. Wow,
my very first experience. Though I was told that I
wasn't doing a medium rating and I was pretending just
(41:52):
to get the hang of it. So the words were
invent that there's someone standing behind her partner, Invent what
they look like, invent what details about their life, and
invent that there's a message that they want to share.
I just invented a man standing behind my partner who
(42:16):
was a grandfather on her mom's side. His name was Jan.
He was a fisherman in Denmark. Died of lung cancer,
a big gap between his front teeth. Never told her mom,
his daughter that he loved her and wanted her to
pass on that information. And I opened my eyes having
invented that, and she was crying. Her grandfather's name was Jan,
(42:38):
fisherman in Denmark, gap between his teeth, died of lung cancer,
and she always knew that. Her mom was never as
told I love you, He didn't hug and all that.
So that imagination is the most powerful force. Even Einstein
has some great quote about imagination is the most important
tool we have. So anyone right now, get rid of
(43:01):
the words, oh, it's just my.
Speaker 5 (43:03):
Imagination, because your imagination can be magic, it can be
Let that go. Yeah, do you have any tools in
your new book about helping people?
Speaker 3 (43:15):
It's not just filled with stories, right right? What's in
there that can impact somebody who's reading it their life
right now, whether they're dying or not.
Speaker 1 (43:25):
So one of my favorite things that I like to
tell people is what it feels like, at least for
me oftentimes, to connect with spirit. If I were to
have you close your eyes right now and imagine the
beach and feel the sand beneath your toes and the water,
hear it crash up on the shore, maybe hear the
cry of the seagull, and feel the breeze, you know,
(43:48):
coming over your skin or through your hair. But at
the same time, you're also aware that you're sitting right
where you are. So that's what it feels like to
be in two worlds at once. Sometimes it could feel
so subtle, like that I am at the beach and
yet I'm in this chair, and that is easy for
us to dismiss. Sometimes it can feel like a memory
(44:10):
or a thought or something that's right on the tip
of our tongue, but we're not quite there. That's what
sometimes connecting to spirit feels like. Whenever we do it enough, though,
and we become familiar, those images of the beach become
more vibrant, and they become more real than us sitting
in our chair. That takes practice, but when it first
is happening, it feels like a memory or just a
(44:34):
thought that you're creating. But thoughts have power. So I
would say to not dismiss the experiences and to recognize
wherever you want to be imagine that you're there, and
that is the start of being in two worlds at once.
And it can feel really subtle like that, and to
not dismiss it. That's one of my biggest, I think
beginner teaching things.
Speaker 3 (44:54):
And that's in the book Healing Whispers from Spirit Guides,
Bringing the Gap between Life and the after Life with
a Deaf Doula's Wisdom. Can we talk about our teams?
Do we all have a team? Do we all have
a spirit team? Are there people up in me on
my mission right now?
Speaker 1 (45:09):
Yes, of course we all have a team. I call
my team a team. I called them eighteen. That was
the name that came to me, and then my husband
reminded me of a crime fighting group from the eighties.
I think with mister T. They were called the eighteen.
It's a little bit before my tie, but not too much.
I remember mister T. He's you know, I pity the fool,
you know. So then I thought, oh my gosh, I
have chosen a lame name, like I don't want this
(45:30):
to be my team's name. And so I said, all right, guys,
I want to change your name. I want it to
be something that means oneness or unity, and I want
it to be something singular, and I want it to
more represent a collective. And so I was like, balls
in your court, here we go. And I left right
after that to take my cat to the vet. And
as I'm pulling into the vet, all the parking places
(45:52):
are being blocked by a delivery of a temporary dumpster
and it's a green dumpster, and in big white letters
it said a team on the side of the dumpster.
And I was like, okay, you guys, I guess we're
sticking with a team. And it was in that moment
that I realized that A is singular and it does
mean one in the English language, and that it implies
we are a team. We're a team together and they
need me as much as I need them, and so
(46:14):
a team stuck. So I'm not trying to rip it
off of the crime fighting heroes from the eighties, but
that's my team and spirit, and my team in spirit
tells me that we all have a team in spirit,
we all have helpers and guides, and they may not
all just be ancestors. A lot of people think that
their team and spirit is people that they've lost their grandmother,
(46:35):
their dad, Things like that, and it can be it
can be your ancestors. But in my experience, when I
tune into other people's teams and spirit, there's alternate beings.
There's angelics or what I perceive to be angelics. There's
masters or what we perceive to have masters on our team.
I think that spirit takes forms based on what we
(46:57):
need so that we can more easily connect. Because for me,
knowing a name for my team and spirit, being able
to call certain voices that I hear a specific name
really helps my human self to be able to call
upon a certain spirit to connect to. So a team
has several members and I will talk to them individually.
And when I meet other people who have their teams,
(47:20):
I have found that they feel it's easier to connect
once they assigned them a name or a physical appearance
in their mind. So, yes, we all have a team
and spirit. And if you're wanting to connect to yours,
there are so many amazing meditations out there that allow
you to practice connecting to your team and spirit. And
don't be dismissive if you barely imagine that beach but
it's a person, go for it and just say, all right,
(47:43):
that's one of my guides.
Speaker 3 (47:44):
Great. Thank you. When you talked about the beach, yes,
I had my eyes closed. I was there. I could
feel the sand between my toes. But it reminded me
of some loved ones I have that are in the
spirit world. I could be say, editing a podcast, asked,
or paying the bills or something, and suddenly I get
(48:05):
this memory and the feeling of things that we've done together.
Don't discount those anyone. Those are little calling cards from
our loved ones. I think working the same way, right, that's.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
So well said, little calling cards from our loved ones.
I love that, and they are working the same way,
and that's how you receive information. So are you very visual?
Are you visual?
Speaker 3 (48:28):
Per science? Yes?
Speaker 1 (48:29):
Yeah, that's how they're working with you.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
Thank you so much. Well, our time is just about
up for today. What closing words do you want to
share with our listener today? Maybe a little gemstone they
can use in their life right now today or whatever
you want to share.
Speaker 1 (48:46):
Oh, there's so much. I suppose I would say that
the power of your entire life is right now. Everything
is in this present moment. Everything, every choice that you've
ever made leading up to this moment, you can let
that go. Everything about your future, you can let that go.
What do you want to do right now? How do
(49:07):
you want to live right now? If there are things
that you haven't said to your loved ones, if there
are avenues to open up conversation with loved ones, it's
time to take steps to do that. We are not
guaranteed tomorrow. Death comes for the healthy and the sick,
the old and the young, and none of us are
guaranteed tomorrow. So if you can go to bed tonight
(49:27):
thinking it would be okay, then you're living your life
just right where you should be.
Speaker 3 (49:32):
Thank you to our wonderful guest, and if you'd like
to see her, you can simply visit her website, Helen
Gretchen Jones dot com. Our loved ones are only a thought,
a breath, a heartbeat away, and I know we all
want big signs that they're around. But again, don't say
(49:53):
it's just my imagination. Pay attention to where those thoughts
and images and memories and shared time times together seem
to come out of the blue and into your mind.
That's them saying I'm right here with you. Don't forget.
Come visit me at Weedn'tdie dot com. Join a free
Sunday gathering with medium demonstration. And we have a whole
(50:13):
bunch of new events and classes planned on our store page.
I'm Sandra Champlain. Thank you so much for listening to
Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to
Coast AM Paranormal Podcast Network.
Speaker 2 (50:39):
Thanks for listening to the iHeartRadio and Coast to Ghost
Day and Paranormal Podcast Network. Make sure and check out
all our shows on the iHeartRadio app or by going
to iHeartRadio dot com.
And you're here.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Thanks for choosing the iHeartRadio and Coast to Ghost Day
and Paranormal Podcast Network. Your quest for podcasts of the paranormal, supernatural,
and the unexplained ends here. We invite you to enjoy
all our shows we have on this network, and right now,
let's start with Chase of the Afterlife with the Sandra Champlain.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Welcome to our podcast. Please be aware the thoughts and
opinions expressed by the host are their thoughts and opinions
only and do not reflect those of iHeartMedia, iHeartRadio, Coast
to Coast, am employees of Premiere Networks, or their sponsors
and associates. We would like to encourage you to do
(00:42):
your own research and discover the subject matter for yourself. Hi,
I'm Sandra Champlain. For over twenty five years, I've been
on a journey to prove the existence of life after death.
On each episode, we'll decid us the reasons we now
know that our loved ones have survived physical death and
(01:05):
so will we. Welcome to Shades of the Afterlife. We
were first introduced to the topic of shared deaf experiences
back on episode twenty three, talking to William Peters, who
runs the Shared Crossing Project. You may also remember talking
to doctor Raymond Moody and co author Paul Perry about
(01:27):
their latest book on shared deaf experiences back on episode
one fifty one. Today we'll continue our look at shared
death experiences as we meet Helen Gretchen Jones. By day,
she and her husband run a photography, film and lighting
company in Austin, Texas. She's also a mom and a
(01:48):
death doula, having volunteered hundreds of hours by the bedside
of those passing with an organization called NODA, which stands
for No One Dies Alone. As a child, Gretchen had
a special relationship with wise voices who would talk to her,
and attributes that to spending much time alone and what
(02:09):
we now call a meditative state. I ask that while
you listen today, you engage your own imagination as she
tells you some of her stories. Gretchen has recently written
a book called Healing Whispers from Spirit Guides, bridging the
gap between life and the afterlife with a death Dula's Wisdom.
(02:29):
I first met Gretchen six or seven years ago at
a medium workshop in New Orleans. She's a kind and
beautiful soul for sure, and be sure to listen to
the end. She's got some great advice and what we
can all do to slow down and bridge the two worlds.
Here's Gretchen.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
I am in Central Texas and I am married with
a couple of kids, but I do death doula work,
which is a little outside of social norms. A death
doula is someone who holistically helped someone transitioned to the
other side. I think it's a growing need with the
changing shifts in our healthcare system. A lot of times
(03:09):
nurses used to be able to have the time to
sit bedside, and now they have so much red tape
and paperwork. It's very helpful now to have someone else
that can come in and sit beside people who are transitioning.
And I think that's where the death doula can come
in and really help there. And so it's one of
my favorite things that I get to do, and I
am just so honored to be able to sit bedside
(03:31):
with some of these patients.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
How did you first get involved in that, because it's
not the average person that says, gee, i'd like to
do this.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Well, I've always had a connection with spirit my whole life,
so that has always been a natural part of my
own perspective of the world. But in twenty fifteen, my
father transitioned and it was unexpected for a lot of
people in my family. He had Cross of the liver
and he was only in his fifties, so it sort
(03:59):
of took the family by surprise. There wasn't closure, and
a lot of people had a lot of unsaid things,
especially my sisters, around his death, and it just made
me think, Wow, if there was a way that I
could sit with families and help them find closure, find
peace before their loved one transitions so that other families
don't have to experience what my family did, or if
(04:20):
there was a way to help people to transition so
they don't feel that fear around death, that would also
be something I would like to be a part of.
And through a series of their indipitous events, I came
across certification as a death duela and I just dove
right in and I haven't looked back since.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
Those first days must have been tough, you know, we
have that feeling that we want to do something, and
I know there's a lot of joy within hospice, but
you also get to know people and then they.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Depart, so with hospice. That's where it is the hardest,
because you do form those relationships with loved ones. They
become your family. Sometimes I've had patients last as long
as five years on hospice. I also volunteer with NOA,
which is a no one Dies Alone program, and in
that situation, you only know these people for one to
three days typically, so it's a much shorter time. But
(05:11):
at first I thought I really needed to be the
strong one. I needed to not cry, I needed to
have the answers, I needed to have it all together
whenever I sat with these people and their families. But
that really takes a toll on you because it is
an emotional situation that you're sitting in. Once I allowed
myself to be free to experience exactly what I was
experiencing in the moment, and I do tear up with
(05:33):
every one of my patients. It made not only the patient,
but the family feels safe to be vulnerable. Also. They
all break down and then they say what they need
to say. They find that strength within themselves to say
those final words that maybe they're holding up. They don't
want to appear weak or as a burden often and
so they hold it all in. But if one person
(05:53):
breaks down, then everybody else starts to and it's the
most beautiful thing to unfold. So long apply that resistance,
trying to be the strong one, I allow what is
to just happen, and it's amazing how everyone seems to
open up. It's also important to note that the fear
around death is often just after and before we are
diagnosed with the terminal illness. The fear seems to go
(06:16):
away in that final week. There seems to be a
shift as that person moves into two worlds at once.
They start to see things and they start to have
moments of peace and moments of hey, maybe it's not
so scary after all. And it's the family who hangs
on to this fear around death while the other person
is moving into accepting it and recognizing loved ones at
(06:39):
the bedside. So the fear is what we put on
ourselves before death and when we first receive eterminal illness.
But when we actually start the process of transitioning, that
fear releases, and it really is beautiful. So I have
witnessed people standing outside their bodies, other beings of light, angelics,
other family members. I've actually had shared experiences where I
(07:01):
go part way into the spirit world with some of
my clients and patients. I'm a believer, but I'm absolutely
open to it, which is I think why some of
these experiences are happening so frequently for me. It's actually
maybe too why I'm a death doula, because there's such
a moment of joy that I get to experience at
the bedside, so it doesn't fill me with all this
sadness the way maybe some other people might perceive it.
(07:22):
It's glorious. I would say. One story that I'm really
enjoying sharing right now is a story about Missus Wilma.
And Missus Wilma was on the NODA program. When you
volunteer with NOTA they send out an email just like
an email blast to everybody, and you fill up a
time slot in three hour time shifts. I signed up.
I went down to the hospital and sat with Missus Wilma,
(07:45):
and on my way there, I knew that I was
going to be visiting an elderly woman, and I knew
that she had family, but that her family wouldn't be
able to make it in. When I got there, that
was validated, and I think the reason spirit gives me
that information. They give me off times a age or
a race or a gender is just so that when
I arrivee and it's validated, I know that I'm tuned
(08:06):
into spirit. So I think that's why they give it
to me. So I knew when I showed up there
she was, it was validated. And I sit down. She
looks so peaceful already, and I start my own little
ritual of like prayer and intention, and I place my
hands on her hand, and out of the corner of
my eye, I see a little girl walk in. And
then it occurred to me. She was in black and white.
(08:29):
It's a younger version of Missus Wilma. She's probably twelve
or thirteen years old. She's wearing her Sunday best. She's,
you know, got her hair twisted in little pigtails. And
she walks over to me and takes my right hand.
My left hand is holding elderly Missus Wilma's hand. When
(08:49):
this happens, the entire hospital room transforms into this forest.
So I am aware that I am in two worlds
at once. I'm very much aware that I am observing
elderly missus Wilma in the hospital room. I'm aware of
the navy blue chair that I am sitting in, and
then I'm simultaneously aware of standing in this forest holding
(09:10):
young Missus Wilma's hand, and I had this amazing feeling
that I was bigger than my body, bigger and free,
this amazing feeling of freedom. If you put me in
a bigger room, I would have been bigger than that room.
It was just the most glorious feeling. And then I
had this knowing that there was an overarching theme in
(09:31):
Missus Wilma's life where separation was the main part of
one of her big lessons or experiences she wanted to have.
So in her childhood there was a whole lot of segregation.
She lived through that, and then now in death she's
dying without her family, so separated again, and so this
was a big part of her learning experience. So as
(09:52):
we're standing in this forest, she tells me, we're going
to climb this tree. Young Missus Wilma does and just
by thinking about it, We're at the top of the
t and I can see full three sixty even though
I'm just staring straight ahead, and she tells me that
this tree is a life. But if we look more closely.
Every single root on this tree is a life. Every
(10:13):
single root that branches off of another roof is its
own little life. Every branch is its own life, every
branch branching off that branch is its own life. Every
single leaf is its own life. And yet it's all connected,
and it's all in service to the greater whole of
this tree. And then if we pull back even further,
this tree is not just one life. It's part of
(10:35):
this whole forest. And if we pull back even further,
this forest is part of an entire ecosystem. And it
was as though she had this final moment and a
student to teach that we aren't separate, that we are
all connected, even though we perceive ourselves to have all
individual lives. And so in this last final moments of
(10:55):
her life, she took the opportunity to teach from her
experience of separation and segregation to teach this moment of
unity and connection of all things. So that was one
of my favorite experiences. And as she took her final breath,
I'm holding her hand with my left hand in the hospital,
and missus Wilma's holding my right hand, and it was
(11:16):
just this glorious moment of just unity and it was
so beautiful.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
Thank you for sharing that. Now, it's not the average
person that might pick up on that. So I want
to get into some of your beliefs about the afterlife.
I know you've been trained as a medium, intuitive hypnosis, reikie,
past life regressions, theology. There's a lot to you. So
to everyone who's listening right now, you just didn't walk
(11:43):
in and ooh all these things happened. You're open to it.
Do you want to talk a little bit about your
history and how you first started believing in a bigger picture,
believing in the afterlife, believing in the soul. When I
was very little, I would hear a voice. And I
could be four or five, we're talking very.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Very young, and the voice was very helpful, and it
was always guiding me. I just assumed everyone heard this
voice or had this voice. The voice was sometimes masculine,
sometimes feminine, but it always came from the same place somehow.
When I would get overwhelmed as a little girl, I
would go sit in an empty bathtub, close the bathroom door,
and I would just focus on the silence, and sometimes
(12:22):
the voice would find me. In those moments of silence
and sometimes not. My family was not religious, nobody practiced anything.
They weren't spiritual.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
E there.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
What I know I was doing now was the form
of meditation, but my family would not have known what
that was even then. It was just something I was doing.
When I would see spirit and I would share that
with my family, it was dismissed. My dad used to say,
I believe you believe that's what you saw. The experiences
with spirit were so beautiful and so comforting and so transformative.
(12:52):
I never questioned if they were real.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
We need to take a quick break and we'll be
right back with Gretchen Jones. You're listening to of the
Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast, a m
paranormal podcast network. Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.
(13:28):
I'm Sandra Champlain and we're here with Helen Gretchen Jones,
a death doula, and she was just sharing about being
a little child and hearing the most beautiful voices when
her mind was quiet. Let's continue.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
The experiences with spirit were so beautiful and so comforting
and so transformative. I never questioned if they were real,
but it did make me question the wisdom of my parents,
if I could trust their teachings, because it didn't make
me think, oh, I must have imagined that, because I
knew it was real, I thought, oh, are they not
experience that? And then I started being more mindful over
(14:03):
who I shared those experiences with. Once I went to
college and graduated, went to grad school, got married, had kids,
I really put this on the back burner. I focused
on all the amazing things that this physical life had
to offer, and I was going full force. I did
not want to take time for any kind of spiritual stuff.
But my team and spirit started coming around and started
(14:25):
wanting me to focus on compassion. I think one of
the things when we're really young children, teenager, and even
into our early adulthood, were so self focused because we
have to for survival. We have to learn what our
family wants so that we can be accepted, and then
we change who we are so we can fit into
that family, and then we do that with our friends
through middle school and high school, and then in college
(14:47):
you're starting out and you're like, who am I as
a young adult, so you're still so self focused, and
my team and spirit decided it was time for me
to move from that self focused attitude and move into
a more compassionate way of viewing the world. And they
would always remind me put yourself in their shoes, not
how you would do something different, not to try to
fix your circumstance, but just put yourself in their shoes.
(15:09):
And that's it. Trying to help me understand what someone
else was going through. And so, with the help of
who I call a team, my team and spirit, I
started allowing their teachings to change my perspectives around life.
But I've always had a spiritual connection. I even studied
in college art history and theology. I was looking for
(15:29):
the answers like if my parents didn't have them, who
would I had to be out there, And the more
research I did, the more questions I had over and over.
And I think that the most important thing that we
can all do, where we can all start is by
turning inward and trusting our own connection to our own
higher self or spirit or God or universe energy, whatever
(15:50):
word works for you, it's all the same, really, So
if we're tuning into that, we can start to navigate
our own challenges with a little more grace and peace
by connecting to what we can trust absolutely.
Speaker 4 (16:03):
When did reiki and mediumship come into the picture. It
all happened really so fast. I had this idea after
I became a death dealer that I would help out
with green funerals and green burials and things like that.
And I thought I was going to something like that,
like a conference, and I actually found myself at a conference.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
It was a bunch of mediums. They were there, and
I'm like, where am I? I thought I was at
this funeral thing. And then I started thinking, well, mediumship
and then I hear people doing reiki. Right after that,
I was taking that mediumship workshop in Louisiana where we
first met, and it just unfolded all so quickly, and
I just was so thirsty for as much knowledge as
I could get. I started taking courses and everything because
(16:43):
I wanted to know more. So I got certified and
everything as quickly as I could.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
I'm ever so proud to have that first conversation in
Louisiana to where you are today. I know you just
put the book out, which is fantastic. Congratulations. It is
a labor of love. It was tell us about it,
what can we find? What is it about? And maybe
some stories from your book.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
Sure. So a few years ago, I was laying in
bed and I heard a voice outside. So normally I
hear the voice of my team and spirit inside my head.
This one came right in front of my face from
outside my head, and it said, you're going to write
a book. And I was like, write a book? Are
you sure?
Speaker 5 (17:24):
Like?
Speaker 1 (17:25):
I don't feel qualified. Surely, I didn't have anything worth
saying that someone would want to read. That was sort
of my idea, and they said it will take two
and a half years to complete and write. What you know,
I didn't know what to write about, had no idea.
What do I know? I know a little about a
lot of things, but I didn't feel like an expert
in any one field. And then it did occur to
(17:45):
me that my favorite thing that was happening were the
transformative bedside experiences of my patients. And I'd already journaled
all the experiences I'm having, and so I referred to
those journals and compiled them my favorite ones into this book.
Every other chapter is one of my patient stories, and
the preceding chapter is something that I've learned from Spirit
and something that I've learned through the process of working
(18:06):
with spirit and people who are dying, and then I
would put a relatable story of one of my patients
as they transitioned. So it's really a teaching book and
then beautiful stories. I end every chapter with a channeled
message from my team and spirit a team, so it's
this kind of compilation of all the beautiful things happening.
(18:27):
I can share one story that's a little out there,
but it is one that happened fairly recently. It is
one that I'm hoping will happen more times for me.
I was out late, later than I normally am, and
I see on my email that there's a request for
a note of visit. I had a feeling that I
should be there for this person, but it was already
(18:48):
so late. It was after midnight. I was so tired.
I just wanted to go to bed. But I looked
on the schedule to see what timeslots were available, and
although I did see there was a six am shift
and that was just a few hours away. But I thought, Okay,
if I'm supposed to be there, guys, I'm talking to
my team in spirit. If I'm supposed to be there,
you guys are going to have to wake me up.
I'm not sitting in alarm, and it's going to have
to be like at four point thirty for me to
(19:09):
get ready in time and get down there. At four
twenty eight, I wake up and I have the song
playing in my head. It's called Colors by the Black Pumas.
The song lyrics are talking about the meadows of green
and the trees and the blue skies, and I'm like, oh,
this is going to be relevant somehow, and I look
at the clock. I'm like, all right, guys, I'm signing up.
I hop in the car, so I drive into the
hospital and I turn on the radio. Colors by the
(19:31):
Black Pumas is playing again, and I'm just like, oh,
this is going to be a thing, okay, And I
have a sudden realization that my patient will be male,
he will be having issues around anxiety, and he would
be black.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Well.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
At that time, I was having panic attacks. They came
out of nowhere. They were really, really scary if you
haven't had them. And I was a little worried about
that anxiety because sometimes I feel like if I watch
it, it might trigger one. So I was like, Okay, let's
see what's going to happen. I get there and mister Virgil,
he is male, he is black, and he is having
(20:06):
panic attacks over and over, ninety seconds of peace followed
by like thirty seconds of panic. So it was hard
to watch if you are unaware of the spiritual aspect
happening bedside and you're just focused on the physical. So
I sit down with him, I put my hands on him,
trying to bring him peace, and when I realized that
(20:27):
wasn't working, I decided to connect to him more on
the spiritual level. And as I did, once again, the
hospital room transformed into the most beautiful scene that you
can imagine. It was a green meadow. There were all
these big, bright flowers. They were bigger and brighter than
any flower that I've ever seen on earth. And there
(20:50):
was like a forest straight ahead and off to the
right a little bit, and everything emanated light from within
every blade of grass, every flower, every tree. It's like
light came out of it. And everything had a sound.
It was as though it had a humming or a
tone of some sort. I really can't explain it, but
it was musical. Didn't have a beat, but there was
(21:11):
this music somehow out of every single thing, and it
was just glorious, and I recognize that I'm standing in
this field right next to mister Virgil. So again I
have this awareness that I am sitting bedside mister Virgil
in the hospital, holding his hand. And also mister Virgil
and I are standing together in this magnificent field of
(21:34):
light and color and sound, and I know that we
have to walk through the forest as part of our journey.
I can hear a party happening over there, and this
is very, very common. There's always a welcome home party
that's happening for our loved ones, and these can vary
from small picnics in a park to something grand in
some kind of ballroom. And it's always fun to see
(21:56):
which kind of party my patient's going to be having,
because it gives me a lot of insight to who
they are or what they like that maybe I didn't
realize in their physical life. So we start walking towards
the forest, and all of a sudden, I feel mister
Virgil have just a real rush of apprehension. Fear comes
through him, and he didn't want to enter the forest.
It's like he knew once he entered and went into
(22:18):
that welcome home party, which I can see his mom
at I don't know what seemed final for him. So
just then a being of light comes out of the
forest and she is blue and white light, and she
is absolutely gorgeous and just peace rushes over you when
you see her. And it was me. I was the
being of light. I don't know how now I am
(22:39):
in three places at once. This is the only time
this has ever happened. But we are multi dimensional beings
after all, and so I'm thinking that this is how
this all relates. I am physically in the room with
mister Virgil as his body is shutting down. I am
observing all of this happening from the field of flowers
with mister Virgil, and I'm also the me of light
coming from the forest to aid him through his journey
(23:02):
through the forest. So it was and continues to be
the most astounding experience so far as he's having all
this apprehension, I bring a gift out of I don't
know nowhere. I resent him with a small gift, and
it's a little box wrapped in a purple ribbon, and
I explained to him that this is his gift of life,
(23:22):
and that inside this little box is every experience he
has ever had, as mister Virgil, and he's like, I
don't think I can go in there to the forest
because I have sinned and I have so many things
that I'm regretful of and things I shouldn't have done. I,
the me of Light, had this unconditional love for him,
an unconditional love I have never felt before. I love unconditionally,
(23:46):
but this was different. It didn't matter what he did,
it didn't matter who he was, it didn't matter any
of that. I loved him so much. It just was
all in this box, like it was just experience and
that was it. There was no judgment at all. I've
projected somehow that he was safe and that he was loved,
and nothing like that mattered. And he agreed to enter
(24:08):
the forest, and so he goes with the Mea of Light.
The other Mee stays in the field of flowers, and
yet I'm watching, somehow observing them as they walk through
the forest, and I'm also present as the Mea of Light,
very much aware of walking with him through the forest.
Suddenly again he has this wave of fear come over him,
and I get really really big, the Mea of Light does,
(24:31):
and I scoop him up like he's a baby, and
I hold him and I rock him and I kiss
the top of his head, and the entire forest I
don't know fades away and it becomes a backdrop of stars,
and it's like we're in space somehow, and I'm holding
him until he felt ready again to go on the trip,
and then I put him back down. We're back in
the forest and we continue our journey. As we get
(24:55):
to the edge of the forest, we can see the
party and he decides he's not re ready to go
in yet and wants to sit down. Oh one more
thing I forgot to mention. He asks the Me of
Light what's going to happen to my nephew and my uncle?
And the Me of Light rejects to him potential possibilities
and outcomes for both of these people. But when that happens,
(25:19):
my awareness wouldn't let me see what was being projected
as the Me of light. It shot back to the
observer in the field.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back.
You're listening to Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio
and Coast to Coast am Pironormal Podcast Network. Welcome back
(25:55):
to Shades of the Afterlife. I'm Sandra Champlain, and you're
listening to how Gretchen Jones talking about a patient she
was with before he passed, mister Virgil comforting him in
the share death experience of a forest.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
He sat on the log and he decided you needed
a minute to take time before he went into the
welcome party where his mom was waiting and other people.
Just then a nurse comes in and I all of
a sudden shoot back to my physical self, and she's
chatting about the bachelorette party she's about to go to
for the weekend and get in his vitals, and I
just thought it was so funny. She's interrupting at homecoming
(26:32):
party talking about the bachelorette party, and it was just
so interesting and how everything was just all connected. She
has no idea that she's left him about to transition
right there on the edge of the forest, or that
I was in three worlds at once, all at one time.
It was time for me to leave on that shift,
and I really wanted to stay. That the next volunteer
(26:53):
had shown up, and so I allowed them to stay.
And as I was leaving, that's when mister Virgil finally
walked into the welcome home party. But it was one
of the most profound experiences I've ever had. I'm looking
forward to having more of those.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Incredible. So you're saying that's when he passed just shortly after, Yes,
probably at peace. Wow, So you experienced these And if
I was a skeptic, I would say those all sound
great that you experience them, But have you received any
verified information. I don't not believe you, because I do.
I think we are multi dimensional beings. I've heard just
(27:29):
some incredible stories and when we slow down, when we
study psychic and mediumship and explore what's possible, I know
your real gift to people as a death duela. But
if there was somebody skeptical saying, well, these are your experiences,
how do we know.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
So for a lot of people, unless they're having a
near death experience where they can come back and verify,
if they're all the way transitioning, then it's very difficult
to prove. But I can say that these people have
similar experiences even with people not who are dying, but
who have Alzheimer's dementia or a condition at birth that
kept them from being nonverbal. So even if they're not transitioning,
(28:10):
yet they step out of their bodies very very frequently.
And I have been able to work with families through
some of these situations, and when I explain something like, hey,
they're telling me this, or hey, they're telling me that
through Alzheimer's or dementia, or even one case which I
haven't written about, will call him Eric. Eric is a
(28:31):
male in his twenties. He's quadriplegic, and at two years
old he developed a condition that made him nonverbal. His
mother hired me because they were told that he was
probably going to be transitioning soon. So I was coming
in to sort of be a death duela for the
family and for him. And I would like to say
(28:51):
he's still going, he's still here as of now, but
because he's nonverbal, there's been some situations with the family
where family has different ideas of how they want to
proceed with him. And so he was able to very
clearly tell me certain things that were uncomfortable, that were
causing pain. I relayed this information to the family because
(29:14):
he's standing outside his body, He's right there, and I
tell this to the family and they're like, no, no,
that doesn't make sense, No, that doesn't make sense, and
I'm just like, Okay. Well, she calls me a few
days later, she goes, well, we went ahead and took
him into the doctor just in case, and you're right,
he had this going on with his body on that side.
He had this going on with that body. And I'm
just like, yeah, because he's saying it, he's standing outside
(29:34):
his body. He's right there. So without giving away his help,
I haven't thought how to word some of this because
of the privacy of the family and the fact that
they're still around. But the fact that they had no
idea this was going on within their son's body or
their brother's body, and then it was validated a few
days later when they decided just to go check it
out at the hospital was very validating to the fact
(29:57):
that he was communicating very clearly and very fac actively.
He had some other things that he wanted to negotiate
with the families on how relationships were unfolding with them
and how his purpose has been in one way or
another to unify the family, and he feels like it's
difficult for him to move on with everyone fighting over
how he should be moving on. So a lot of
(30:19):
that got resolved after they had it validated, and so
that was very helpful and healing. So even people who
aren't dying who later can have the evidence validated is
really really helpful. When I'm helping someone transition, I'm really
focused on how to make that transition more peaceful and
embracing all of the spiritual and physical experiences that go
(30:41):
along with that. So for me, it's very very real.
And I have dealt with many families who don't maybe
believe in this type of situation, and so it's not
my job to convert them. Why would I ever want
to know, But it is my job to bring peace,
and so we can navigate or maybe shift how we
(31:01):
were things so that it brings peace to the family
as well.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Thanks for sharing that. Yeah, it's so difficult. There could
be so much family baggage. And you and I both
have done our share of psychic and medium work, and
the stuff that we think is our imagination. When it
gets confirmed and it's not, you just think, oh my gosh,
you know, how can this be? And so to be
that and be that for the dying person, whether or
(31:26):
not someone believes, And it isn't your job to try
to convince someone. Can you talk about the welcoming as
a dying person, what might tend to happen, whether we
believe or not believe.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
Sure, in every case that I've experienced so far, there
has been a welcome party of sorts, and there's music,
there's decorations, there's loved ones, even people maybe that we
loved that we didn't have in this physical life. We
know them from another time in space. So there's all
sorts of people congregating to welcome you home. You're the
(32:01):
guest of honor. The amount of excitement that I feel
is more excitement than I have felt at any surprise
party or at any gathering. It is overwhelming. It's so joyous.
My grandmother when she transitioned, she was giving her team
in spirit where she was talking to her loved ones
who went before her. She was telling them exactly what
(32:22):
she wanted. She was always in control. She planned events
and parties for our families. So she was very much
into event planning, and so she was telling them exactly
what she wanted before she died. She's like, all right, guys,
when I get over there, I'm going to want to
be on a golf course. So when I go over there,
so she wanted it to be at the country club.
She wanted it to be casual, she wanted everybody there.
(32:43):
She was talking about every way she can plan it.
So she was planning her own homecoming party. My other
grandmother was completely different. She had a little bit of
fear around dying. And her welcome home party was something
I hadn't seen. But my grandfather was sitting outside of
a dela livery room in a hospital and she was
going to be delivered into the other world. And back then,
(33:07):
men weren't allowed in the delivery room, so he was
waiting outside the door. So that's how it was. He
was waiting for her to be delivered into this world.
And down the hallway, just a couple of doors down
was this all white, bright room that was so bright
it was just light and all of these people. I
saw him open the door and tell everybody it's time.
And when he did that, I could see some of
(33:27):
her children, I could see some of her siblings. I
saw people that I didn't even recognize, and they were
all just anticipating just the best time with her. And
it was as though it was in a delivery room.
So what an unusual party, But it was something that
sort of suited that grandmother. It was like being rebirthed
into something, and so that worked for her, whereas my
(33:49):
other grandmother throwing parties for all her life and very controlling.
She was telling people what she wanted. When she transitioned
and she got it, she was there, she was wearing
a visor, just like she would play on the golf course.
So these welcome parties, it's a way to have someone
feel loved. It's a way to have someone feel that
they're not alone and that this world is not so
(34:10):
different than where we're coming from, but it's filled with
so much more. I don't know. Just beauty and grace
and understanding and freedom is what it feels like. Expansiveness
We as human beings, we'll never get our heads around
how glorious. The next stage is our returning home. I'll
(34:30):
put it that way. I think we're here just for
a short time and we go back and like we
welcome a.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Baby to this world. I mean, it's a grand celebration
and then a death. Although many cultures do celebrate death
our Central and South American countries and others here, I
know it's fear and I don't want to go and
to have loved ones show up. And I've heard many,
(34:58):
many stories of people who verbalized who they see and
how they see them, and so often they might not
even know somebody's deceased, and there they are, and that
feeling of just like I'm going home, you know. So
I get it, that rebirth, that big celebration that we're
back together again. And I remember my grandmother before she
(35:20):
passed one week short of her ninety first birthday, and
everybody in her life had died, all of her friends
and husband and almost all brothers and sisters. So she
wasn't afraid. And she says, when God calls me forth,
I can't come fifth. That was her line.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
But just getting that reunion.
Speaker 3 (35:41):
And I've lived a good life and now I'm ready
to go home. I'm ready to see everybody again. And
I have full one hundred percent confidence that that's how
goes and there and then we get to like, go,
oh my gosh, that life will make this life here
seem like just a dream.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Yes, yes, absolutely, And when I'm in the other space
in between walking with people to their parties, for example,
it feels so much more real than when I come
back to this reality. This reality feels confined or restricted
somehow than when I'm there, and I know that I'm
not even experiencing all of it, just a little snippet,
(36:19):
but it's so much bigger and brighter, and the light
and the sound everything is just somehow more amazing and
more intense than it is here here. I feel not trapped,
that's not a good word. I want to be here,
but limited a little bit. And we aren't limited. We
are limitless, and we are perceived limited I think by
our brains that kind of shut out some of our
(36:40):
otherworldly experiences that are happening right here with us right now.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
If you're having these experiences, tells me other people can
have these experiences.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
Yeah, how can we begin now?
Speaker 3 (36:52):
I know not everybody wants to be a death doula,
or maybe this will open the door for some volunteers
with NODA no one dies alone. Wouldn't that be great
coming out of this great episode? But how do we start?
Is it meditation? Is it being present? Is it a prayer?
What advice would you give all of that?
Speaker 1 (37:14):
So meditation often comes with a little bit of apprehension
for some people who just absolutely say I cannot meditate,
and so I sometimes say, well, then, don't call it meditation, right,
call it sitting in silence or closing your eyes is
really helpful to remove some of those distractions in your
physical reality.
Speaker 3 (37:31):
I would say start now. I'm going to pause right now,
because in the next segment Gretchen will go on in
even more detail about how we can each slow down
connect with our imagination, which, as it proves, may not
be our imagination to our loved ones in the shared
(37:52):
death experience. So we'll be right back. You're listening to
Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to
Coast and Paranormal Podcast Network. Welcome back to Shades of
(38:22):
the Afterlife. I'm Sandra Champlain and we're here with Helen
Gretchen Jones. As she's just beginning to explain how we
can each tap in to the other side and possibly
have a shared experience.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
Sitting in silence or closing your eyes is really helpful
to remove some of those distractions in your physical reality.
I would say start now, Start now. Don't wait until
someone's dying. But if you are already in a position
where someone has been diagnosed with the terminal illness, again,
start now and take time every day and just sit
for a few minutes. It doesn't have to be some
(38:55):
overthought process. Just sit quietly for a few minutes, say,
set an intention, whatever feels right for you, talk to God, universe, angels,
whatever again feels right for you, and you just say, hey, guys,
I would like to have a shared death experience. Now
I'm going to sit quietly and if you can help
me practice receiving information so that when the time comes,
(39:16):
I can have one and then write it down. I
cannot stress that enough write it down, because you will forget.
And if you go back and you were to do this,
even for ten days straight, and you go back and
look at day one and then you look at day ten,
you're going to be like, I think I'm discerning these
messages a little more now than I was when I
first started, even just in a short time like that,
(39:39):
because at first you start to think, am I making
this up? Everything feels made up? And you know what
I say to that, I say, make it up because
this world is co created and we are all co
creating it together, and your imagination is part of creation.
It's part of how we create things. So if you're
feeling like you just want to explore what your imagination
can do visually. That's an excellent way to open the
(39:59):
door to spirit leading you to impressions. Absolutely feel like
you're making it up. Go for it, and this is
a good way to start. And then when you allow
yourself to move past that a little bit, you'll start
to have discernment over what is actually coming in as
an impression from spirit and what you're creating. A good
way to tell is if you're creating it, you take
(40:20):
time in your head to kind of think about what
you want to create. I want to see a blue sky,
I want to see a waterfall. Now, if it's being
given to you, all of a sudden, you just see
blue sky, waterfall, green meadow. It all comes in super
fast like a download, bam. The more you practice, the
more you start to recognize what's made up and what's not.
(40:40):
And even someone who's been doing this a long time,
I've been doing it for several years now. And just
like when Eric's family told me, no, that's not right,
I left feeling a little defeated, like how did I
mess this up? I really missed the mark here, and
I felt like I had failed the family, And so
I was really grateful when they called back a few
days later to validate those things coming through. So even
(41:01):
people who are doing it all the time feel like,
am I making this up? Did I interpret that message correctly?
That's part of it. That's okay. Allow yourself to experience,
and as you practice that, when the opportunity comes for
a shared death experience, you're already open to spirit. You've
already learned what it feels like to allow the outside
distractions to fall away, and you can be open to
(41:23):
what comes through. So I would say practice solitude and
writing it down good words.
Speaker 3 (41:30):
I was on an interview earlier this morning. Somebody was
interviewing me and I talked about my first medium experience
and I was one hundred percent accurate with names, places, everything. Wow,
my very first experience. Though I was told that I
wasn't doing a medium rating and I was pretending just
(41:52):
to get the hang of it. So the words were
invent that there's someone standing behind her partner, Invent what
they look like, invent what details about their life, and
invent that there's a message that they want to share.
I just invented a man standing behind my partner who
(42:16):
was a grandfather on her mom's side. His name was Jan.
He was a fisherman in Denmark. Died of lung cancer,
a big gap between his front teeth. Never told her mom,
his daughter that he loved her and wanted her to
pass on that information. And I opened my eyes having
invented that, and she was crying. Her grandfather's name was Jan,
(42:38):
fisherman in Denmark, gap between his teeth, died of lung cancer,
and she always knew that. Her mom was never as
told I love you, He didn't hug and all that.
So that imagination is the most powerful force. Even Einstein
has some great quote about imagination is the most important
tool we have. So anyone right now, get rid of
(43:01):
the words, oh, it's just my.
Speaker 5 (43:03):
Imagination, because your imagination can be magic, it can be
Let that go. Yeah, do you have any tools in
your new book about helping people?
Speaker 3 (43:15):
It's not just filled with stories, right right? What's in
there that can impact somebody who's reading it their life
right now, whether they're dying or not.
Speaker 1 (43:25):
So one of my favorite things that I like to
tell people is what it feels like, at least for
me oftentimes, to connect with spirit. If I were to
have you close your eyes right now and imagine the
beach and feel the sand beneath your toes and the water,
hear it crash up on the shore, maybe hear the
cry of the seagull, and feel the breeze, you know,
(43:48):
coming over your skin or through your hair. But at
the same time, you're also aware that you're sitting right
where you are. So that's what it feels like to
be in two worlds at once. Sometimes it could feel
so subtle, like that I am at the beach and
yet I'm in this chair, and that is easy for
us to dismiss. Sometimes it can feel like a memory
(44:10):
or a thought or something that's right on the tip
of our tongue, but we're not quite there. That's what
sometimes connecting to spirit feels like. Whenever we do it enough, though,
and we become familiar, those images of the beach become
more vibrant, and they become more real than us sitting
in our chair. That takes practice, but when it first
is happening, it feels like a memory or just a
(44:34):
thought that you're creating. But thoughts have power. So I
would say to not dismiss the experiences and to recognize
wherever you want to be imagine that you're there, and
that is the start of being in two worlds at once.
And it can feel really subtle like that, and to
not dismiss it. That's one of my biggest, I think
beginner teaching things.
Speaker 3 (44:54):
And that's in the book Healing Whispers from Spirit Guides,
Bringing the Gap between Life and the after Life with
a Deaf Doula's Wisdom. Can we talk about our teams?
Do we all have a team? Do we all have
a spirit team? Are there people up in me on
my mission right now?
Speaker 1 (45:09):
Yes, of course we all have a team. I call
my team a team. I called them eighteen. That was
the name that came to me, and then my husband
reminded me of a crime fighting group from the eighties.
I think with mister T. They were called the eighteen.
It's a little bit before my tie, but not too much.
I remember mister T. He's you know, I pity the fool,
you know. So then I thought, oh my gosh, I
have chosen a lame name, like I don't want this
(45:30):
to be my team's name. And so I said, all right, guys,
I want to change your name. I want it to
be something that means oneness or unity, and I want
it to be something singular, and I want it to
more represent a collective. And so I was like, balls
in your court, here we go. And I left right
after that to take my cat to the vet. And
as I'm pulling into the vet, all the parking places
(45:52):
are being blocked by a delivery of a temporary dumpster
and it's a green dumpster, and in big white letters
it said a team on the side of the dumpster.
And I was like, okay, you guys, I guess we're
sticking with a team. And it was in that moment
that I realized that A is singular and it does
mean one in the English language, and that it implies
we are a team. We're a team together and they
need me as much as I need them, and so
(46:14):
a team stuck. So I'm not trying to rip it
off of the crime fighting heroes from the eighties, but
that's my team and spirit, and my team in spirit
tells me that we all have a team in spirit,
we all have helpers and guides, and they may not
all just be ancestors. A lot of people think that
their team and spirit is people that they've lost their grandmother,
(46:35):
their dad, Things like that, and it can be it
can be your ancestors. But in my experience, when I
tune into other people's teams and spirit, there's alternate beings.
There's angelics or what I perceive to be angelics. There's
masters or what we perceive to have masters on our team.
I think that spirit takes forms based on what we
(46:57):
need so that we can more easily connect. Because for me,
knowing a name for my team and spirit, being able
to call certain voices that I hear a specific name
really helps my human self to be able to call
upon a certain spirit to connect to. So a team
has several members and I will talk to them individually.
And when I meet other people who have their teams,
(47:20):
I have found that they feel it's easier to connect
once they assigned them a name or a physical appearance
in their mind. So, yes, we all have a team
and spirit. And if you're wanting to connect to yours,
there are so many amazing meditations out there that allow
you to practice connecting to your team and spirit. And
don't be dismissive if you barely imagine that beach but
it's a person, go for it and just say, all right,
(47:43):
that's one of my guides.
Speaker 3 (47:44):
Great. Thank you. When you talked about the beach, yes,
I had my eyes closed. I was there. I could
feel the sand between my toes. But it reminded me
of some loved ones I have that are in the
spirit world. I could be say, editing a podcast, asked,
or paying the bills or something, and suddenly I get
(48:05):
this memory and the feeling of things that we've done together.
Don't discount those anyone. Those are little calling cards from
our loved ones. I think working the same way, right, that's.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
So well said, little calling cards from our loved ones.
I love that, and they are working the same way,
and that's how you receive information. So are you very visual?
Are you visual?
Speaker 3 (48:28):
Per science? Yes?
Speaker 1 (48:29):
Yeah, that's how they're working with you.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
Thank you so much. Well, our time is just about
up for today. What closing words do you want to
share with our listener today? Maybe a little gemstone they
can use in their life right now today or whatever
you want to share.
Speaker 1 (48:46):
Oh, there's so much. I suppose I would say that
the power of your entire life is right now. Everything
is in this present moment. Everything, every choice that you've
ever made leading up to this moment, you can let
that go. Everything about your future, you can let that go.
What do you want to do right now? How do
(49:07):
you want to live right now? If there are things
that you haven't said to your loved ones, if there
are avenues to open up conversation with loved ones, it's
time to take steps to do that. We are not
guaranteed tomorrow. Death comes for the healthy and the sick,
the old and the young, and none of us are
guaranteed tomorrow. So if you can go to bed tonight
(49:27):
thinking it would be okay, then you're living your life
just right where you should be.
Speaker 3 (49:32):
Thank you to our wonderful guest, and if you'd like
to see her, you can simply visit her website, Helen
Gretchen Jones dot com. Our loved ones are only a thought,
a breath, a heartbeat away, and I know we all
want big signs that they're around. But again, don't say
(49:53):
it's just my imagination. Pay attention to where those thoughts
and images and memories and shared time times together seem
to come out of the blue and into your mind.
That's them saying I'm right here with you. Don't forget.
Come visit me at Weedn'tdie dot com. Join a free
Sunday gathering with medium demonstration. And we have a whole
(50:13):
bunch of new events and classes planned on our store page.
I'm Sandra Champlain. Thank you so much for listening to
Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to
Coast AM Paranormal Podcast Network.
Speaker 2 (50:39):
Thanks for listening to the iHeartRadio and Coast to Ghost
Day and Paranormal Podcast Network. Make sure and check out
all our shows on the iHeartRadio app or by going
to iHeartRadio dot com.
Host
Sandra Champlain
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