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Reviews
of Sacred
Encounters:
A Review by Dr. R. LEO SPRINKLE
MUFON UFO Journal, (July 2005), No. 447, p. 14.
The author, Dr. Janet Colli, and her
partner, Dr. Thomas Beck, transformed themselves from Students of Philosophy
to Doctors of Philosophy (with Ph.D.s in Clinical and Transpersonal Psychology).
As Transpersonal Psychologists, Drs. Colli and Beck study consciousness.
Their transformation continues to be helpful to them as they assist [UFO
experiencers] to negotiate their own spiritual
transformations.
Dr. Colli gives her readers not only a scholarly
presentation, but also a lively account of her interactions with two unusual
women, Hayley and Joy. Dr. Colli assisted Hayley in dealing with PTSD
(posttraumatic stress disorder). Dr. Colli recounts Joy's process of merging
meditation and mental health interventions in her spiritual awakening.
Like many [UFO experiencers],
both Hayley and Joy experienced much anxiety and many doubts about their
encounters. For many UFO experiencers and investigators, the emotional
trauma can vacillate between suppression and awareness, between acceptance
and acknowledgment of these experiences. Fear of insanity, or loss of
personal identity, can lead to denial and/or addictive behaviors to ease
the uncertainty.
As a competant and caring clinician, Dr.
Colli is able to sail her ship of psychotherapeutic alliance between Scylla
and Charybdis: the dangerous “rock” of denying debunkers on
the one hand — and the dangerous “whirlpool” of psychopathology
on the other hand. She describes with clarity and compassion, her interactions
with Hayley and with Joy. Both women were able to apprehend and release
their fears, and also move into higher realms of intellectual understanding,
emotional acceptance, and spiritual awareness.
In addition to these detailed investigations,
Dr. Colli provides her readers with references to many authors and many
studies, not only of other UFO investigations, but also of psychological
studies of memory and stress. She refers to the DSM-IV (Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) as well as the meditative
practices of Asian spiritual masters.
The author is able to use her training in
Philosophy as a “shield” to defend against the caustic complaints
of critics; she is able to use her training in Psychology as a “sword”
to seek and find the truth of close encounters. Eventually, Dr. Colli,
as well as Hayley, lay down the sword and shield as Joy surrenders to
Unity Consciousness: in essence, the easing and ending of duality / polarity
as Joy experiences Oneness with All.
In 1901, a Canadian Psychiatrist, Maurice
Buck, M.D, wrote of his investigations of persons who experienced Cosmic
Consciousness. More recently, an American psychiatrist, David R. Hawkins,
M.D., Ph.D., has calibrated levels of consciousness in his 1995 book,
Power vs. Force. Dr.Hawkins has shown that consciousness can be
measured.
Dr. Colli assists her readers not only to
explore Higher Consciousness, but she also responds well to the perennial
question about the motives of “aliens”: “good” or
“evil”? She states, “Ultimately, the answer lies in fostering
our own expansion of consciousness” (p. 289).
Whether the reader is concerned about Earth
and Humanity, or concerned about ET (Extraterrestrial) encounters, the
reading of Sacred Encounters can be an opportunity for enlightenment.
The reader can learn from the Philosophy, the Psychology, and the transformation
of individuals and society through these interactions with aliens / demons
/ angels / ETs, who are intervening in our human history.
Dr. Colli provides this opportunity with
her scholarship, her expertise, and her inner light of spiritual development. —R.
Leo Sprinkle, Ph.D., 5 May, 2005
Beyond the usual UFO literature
A Review by G. Davidson,
Webmaster, “Cosmic Harmony”
I have read a lot of ET / UFO related
books and I would have to put this close to the top. . . . Sacred Encounters
deals extensively with consciousness transformation in the lives of contactees
that Dr. Colli worked with. As their stories unfold we see the initial
extreme fear eventually replaced by love and a feeling of family or community
toward the ET beings they are interacting with.
The story of Joy Gilbert (4 chapters), tells
of her spiritual beginnings with transcendental meditation. From there
she moves on to a Tibetan Lama who further leads her along the pathway
to enlightenment. . . . For me her story was the crown jewel of the book
because it tied together many elements I also have an interest in — meditation,
Tibetan wisdom, and enlightenment. Her journey culminates as her ET family,
a race of higher beings, administers the final awakening ... telling her It's Time to Remember. The veil of forgetfulness slips away,
her ego is shattered, and she slips into full Unity Consciousness.
The author further explores the star visitor
phenomena in terms of the Vedic literature of the East and gives many
first-hand accounts of realization experiences. Finally the book examines
the social forces that are hindering our awareness expansion and how our
awakening might proceed.
I highly recommend Sacred Encounters
to anyone who wants to go beyond the usual sightings and abduction literature
and tie the topic into metaphysical realms of thought.
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“What has been demonstrated, in contexts as difference as medieval Europe, seventeenth-century Siberia and modern America is a constantly repeated pattern involving sightings and encounters, abductions by otherworldly beings, specific types of procedures carried out during abductions, . . . a pattern that appears to hold true at all levels down to the minutest details. Such repetition and cross-cultural consistency should in themselves increase our confidence that we may be dealing with something real here, and at least give us reason to take these phenomena seriously — as those who have experienced them always do.”
—Graham Hancock
(Supernatural: Meetings with the Ancient Teachers of Mankind, p. 210)
“It is a great mystery that people from many different cultures in many different epochs all report encountering supernaturals who are unwilling to be confined to supernatural realms and who — even while they initiate our shamans and bestow the ‘second sight’ and healing power upon them — seem to want to take something of our materiality and incorporate it into their own non-physical lineage. As the first manifestations of these ancient supernatural forces in the technological age, UFO abductions and encounters with aliens have been subjected to an unrelenting campaign of ridicule and abuse by scientists who are strongly wedded to the materialist paradigm.”
—Graham Hancock
(Supernatural, p. 203)
“These worlds are usually invisible to us and our instruments, and are not accessible using our normal state of consciousness. However, just as likely as the theory that these worlds exist ‘only in our minds’ is that they are, in reality, ‘outside us’ and freestanding. If we simply change our brain's receiving abilities, we can comprehend and interact with them.”
—Rick Strassman, M.D.
(DMT: The Spirit Molecule: A Doctor's Revolutionary Research into the Biology of Near-Death and Mystical Experiences, p. 54)
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Expansion of Consciousness
