The UFO Paradox, an extraordinary new book taking a look at many unusual perspectives regarding the UFO / UAP mystery, non-human intelligences, trickster intelligences from other dimensions, and what these mysteries could mean for humanity. A fascinating Interview with Keith Thompson, author, independent journalist, talk radio host, former TV talk show host, and former U.S. Senate staff member. His articles have appeared in the New York Times, Esquire, San Francisco Chronicle, Idaho Statesman, and the Pacific Sun.

In case after case related to UFO encounters and other unknown aerial phenomena (UAP), the same impasse is reached: testimony from witnesses on one side, dismissive responses from the authorities on the other. In the fertile void of this deadlock, however, lie extraordinary possibilities about the nature of mind and matter, spirit and soul, transforming the UFO into a celestial, metaphysical event.

Focusing on the possibilities found by exploring both sides of the UFO debate, veteran UFO observer and reporter Keith Thompson shares profound insights and experiences from his several decades of research, revealing that the UFO phenomenon is decidedly real yet perhaps not what either side of the debate expects. He looks at UFOs as a genuine unknown, from outer space or manifesting from hidden dimensions, as well as the theories of skeptics and debunkers who insist that UFOs can be explained as hoaxes, hallucinations, or misidentified phenomena. He explores the modern flying saucer era against the backdrop of visionary experience—angelic visitations, near-death experiences, shamanic journeys, religious miracles, and fairy tales—and shows how UFOs are simultaneously physical and spiritual, presenting a form of intelligence capable of altering the perceptions of witnesses.

Chronicling his own investigations into the UFO mystery, the author details how he introduced the late Harvard psychiatrist John Mack to accounts of alien abduction and how he was invited by philanthropist Laurance S. Rockefeller to lobby then-president Bill Clinton to disclose government-held UFO information. Sharing stories from his friendship with astronaut Edgar D. Mitchell, among others, the author recounts discussions on how best to interpret UFOs and non-ordinary phenomena of various kinds.

Thompson reveals how the UFO phenomenon ultimately represents a call from the cosmos for humanity to open to greater dimensions of reality and recognize that our understanding of the universe is still far from complete.

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Show Transcript

these are all callings from the cosmos to expand our maps of reality I think that's what they're really here to do it's as as if parts of reality that were once out of our sights are now coming is it is it an emergence of the unconscious in a deepest sense the collective unconscious maybe that that's where these phenomena are coming from dimensions of reality that have always been here but been outside our frame of Consciousness and the UFOs May indeed be coming from other star systems that's the ET hypo I don't dismiss that I simply want to make that one of many hypotheses I think mythology is a way to understand complex human events when you you look at a figure like Hermes in the Greek tradition he's a trickster figure well what is present throughout the UFO phenomenon at every stage trickster what's true what's not true with us today is an author independent journalist talk radio host former TV show host and former US staff member Keith Thompson Keith thank you so much for being here I got to ask how are you doing I'm doing well and I got to say it's great to be on this side of the camera with you I've seen uh I I watch you regularly and I was delighted for the invitation so thank you thank you well today we'll be focusing on your UFO interests and research and what's very interesting is that you had a UFO sighting or got an interest in UFOs when you were in the sixth grade what happened and how did that affect the rest of your life you know it's a good way to put it it was a UFO sighting I cited the UFO phenomenon as a whole I had no background I have no I'm not a UFO experiencer I have had experiences which I describe in the book of a larger reality which which has shaped my interest in this phenomenon but my original introduction was I was 12 years old it was a sixth grade uh we had a teacher who had a little uh formula where we would give current events uh reports and it was my turn to give a current events report and I chose a Michigan sighting that actually turned out to be a legendary sighting it was the one where Air Force consultant J Allen heinik who had such a stored history with the UFO phenomenon flew in as he often did and it was his job to uh review what had happened there on the ground and he gave his report he he let slip a phrase that he came to regret he's he told the news conference when it was time to account for what he had discovered he said there is only one sighting I think I might be able to convey in as a mundane or ordinary phenomenon just on the edge of town near the swamp it is possible he said it could be it might be very conditional he framed it very conditionally that might have been swamp gas which as you know is a phenomenon in which natural decomposing material leaves and branches and and biological soup in the swamp send out gases which then light up there's a luminous quality uh so as soon as he let slip the phrase swamp gas as a possible explanation for a very limited range the reporters jumped up and heinik was mortified as they ran out to the payones to call their news bureaus to say Air Force explains away the Michigan sightings as nothing but swamp gas which he had not done so that was my introduction to the to the plot structure of this the way in which ordinary people uh report extraordinary phenomena the sightings were were quite remarkable lights in the sky apparent craft you know sort of UFO 101 and then the uh official author the the Agents of official culture is what I call them either in the military the news media or Academia in effect or big science as I call it will generally say something like no that didn't happen that couldn't have been real we don't have anything that could do what these alleged craft are doing so go home people to your little lives we've got the sky handled and I have always been struck by the the gap between what Ordinary People report and then this dismissive attitude rather than why aren't the Agents of official culture following and and and showing curiosity and pursuing this well there's a complex story for why that's the case and in any event it was my turn to give a report and I did I told about this Michigan sighting and one of my classmates uh when it was time for question questions and answer said well Keith do you think it was aliens from outer space you know ask the big interpretive question I said well that's a that's an interpretation that some people hold uh I don't hold that view right now but it could be that and I realized I was working through uh how to think about this even at that age and then one student said well what do you think they saw if it wasn't swamp gas and I said well that's the point and that what people reported didn't sound like swamp gas but I don't know either and I have to say Christina that was not a punt on my part it wasn't a Dodge of the question I knew what they had described but how to interpret it whether it was extraterrestrial or what I later learned could have been interdimensional parallel universes psychic phenomena RIT large almost a cosmic Poltergeist do you know all the theories that are in play about this phenomena well to conclude this introduction my teacher came up at the front of the class near the end and she said um I think what Keith is trying to say is with this phenomenon or anything else that's controversial and unknown it's important to ask good questions and to keep an open mind and then she turned to me and often the way a teacher will they use your full name she says Mr Thompson that was a fine report you have the makings of a of a reporter or a scientist maybe even a detective and then she said follow the clues wherever they lead Christine I just want to say that that had a huge effect on me I was a young person who had ambition to be part of the adult world and make a difference and I loved politics and current events I became a journalist so at age 12 to have a teacher give that kind of affirmation you know of the quest that a young person has it was I took it at the time I didn't know this word but it was like a benediction it was like a blessing she had given me go forth ask good questions follow the evidence wherever it leads and you know that's what I've done ever since by tracking this phenomenon I always said whatever the evidence shows follow it investigate it and then interpret that is such a beautiful story and just to have such an amazing teacher to teach the classroom based off of your report to be open-minded but to ask questions and I feel like we've really lost that in the school system in the last 10 15 20 years or so so to be able to witness that be a part of that firsthand is so beautiful and just a way that according to your story the way that you handled the questions and the situations it definitely did pave away for you to get a background in journalism to get a background in politics and even media so how did that moving forward getting into more of more modern times how did that contribute to your to your unique perspective on the UFO phenomenon well I've been asked since my book the UFO Paradox came out I've asked I've been asked sort of a sincere question it kind of threw me I've been asked more than once how did I go from being an investigative journalist that covered stories like and this is sort of a overview criminal justice education how to run a better Marathon I've covered health and fitness I'm athletic myself so I've i' I've followed my S of as Joseph Campbell the the mythologist famously said whatever you do in life follow your follow what excites you follow what interests you so how did you go from being an investigative journalist to becoming a UFO researcher and I said okay there's an implied shift there I am an investigative journalist period And I moved into the UFO phenomenon granted it's an unusual topic it might have been a risky career move I I don't I don't view it that way I in any case I just continued to follow the phenomenon uh follow the evidence and that included when in 1968 the important book that the French astrophysicist jacqu valet published called passport to Magonia in which he said we do ourselves a disservice if we don't realize the fundamental archetypes or themes that are involved in these events including the alien abductions H we do ourselves a disservice if we don't see that these themes are present in all other cultures in other forms and other other Expressions we may be looking at and this is the an interpretive piece here we may be looking at a meta phenomenon a super phenomenon that provides for each culture uh a way to interpret this fundamental interaction with an other and that's the key there's an otherness to this but it's coherent in each culture so for example he said we would need to look at the fairy faith in the Celtic countries because guess what the fairies abduct children now many contemporary UFO researchers and I noticed this it's the same qu kind of response I found in the sixth grade story many contemporary researchers says oh no let's not bring in fairy Faith let's not bring in the reports that shamans interact with non-ordinary beings in their Altered States of cons that makes it so messy let's just frame this as extraterrestrial uh craft that are a little more advanced than ours but it's not such a big leap and and I've come to feel Christina that people who take that you have a dismissive approach to mythology I don't I think mythology is a way to understand complex human events when you you look at a figure like Hermes in the Greek tradition he's a trickster figure well what is present throughout the UFO phenomenon at every stage trickster um what's true what's not true what did Bob Lazar see what did people tell David grush that is in the McDonald Douglas hangers and uh r ell what happened at Roswell you go so deeply into it and the deeper you go the more of a rabbit hole it seems to be each side can present a good case based on whatever facts they pull out of it and there's not dishonesty although there's that too there are the occasional hoaxes so I turn to mythology uh and and and finally I turn to the Paranormal when I say turn to the Paranormal there is a consistent dimension of the Paranormal parapsychological phenomena abductees report telepathic precognitive uh precognition which is the same thing uh Clairvoyance and psychokinesis all kinds of phenomena that are not consistent with our Western materialist uh framework so to put it simply I continue to follow the evidence wherever it leads and that includes now bringing in the Paranormal dimensions and I've come to believe that this phenomena we're not going to get to the heart of it with our existing Paradigm in place uh we've done great things with the materialist framework it allows us to get to the moon and build you know powerful computers called iPhones but it doesn't tell us about the nature of Consciousness and I think that's a huge huge dimension of this so do you think that's the step forward to truly understanding the UFO phenomenon is through the research of Consciousness I think so we really have to find out what it is you know in in the in the current philosophy of mind and current Consciousness research there's a there's a statement we often hear about the hard problem of consciousness ious if the world is made up of Nothing But Blind inert molecules spinning around dead molecules in effect spinning around in some mathematical formula that we uh can't quite explain and that's the ground of being it there's nothing but material phenomena then the idea of how Consciousness emerges doesn't make sense because how do you get the ability to write Shakespeare or write any book the ability to have a subjective experience such as the taste of strawberry or the smell of a rose or the sound of a baby's voice the the sense that there's something that it is like to be me there's something it is like to be myself that deep subjective sense that is apparently not something that developed out of dead matter it doesn't work you can't get subjective qualities like there is something it is like to be me out of such factors as spin charge momentum and other quantitative factors so what I'm saying is it's very likely that Consciousness is at the very ground of everything and everything emerges out of Consciousness in including perhaps the material world what what we call the material world which seemed solid and outside of us seems very likely given the way synchronicities work synchronicities are those meaningful connections between a psychic sense an inner State and an event in the physical world for example when you the phone rings and you been all morning thinking about your old friend Julia from high school it's been 20 or 25 or 30 years whatever happened to Julia we had such good conversations in algebra class you go to the phone the voice says hi Keith you won't believe it this is Julia from high school I've been thinking about you this week I decided to look you up and find you uh that particular uh I'm I'm using that anecdotally but I have had that experience those moments of of um synch it the Carl Jung call so bottom line This the physical world rather than being separate from the psychic World Carl Yung argued that the psychic world is in the physical world seemingly physical world is itself psychic so psychic phenomena are part of the material world that has some bearing I can't say I have the final answers with the phenomena but I think it has some bearing on what's going on in the abductions these are real experiences and real events um but the full extent of the nature of the reality I think is what we need to delve into as John Mack of Harvard famously did I I'd kind of like to stick to this thought process because sometimes people connect Consciousness with quantum mechanics quantum entanglement and you mentioned in your book the Nobel Prize winner Quantum physicist Wolfgang poly and so how might our understanding of quantum particles help us comprehend the UFO phenomenon from your own perspective okay well the simple fact of the matter I'm still amazed at that the Nobel the Nobel Prize for science last year or was it the year before was given to the to body of research that that that identified the entangled Photon entangled particles essentially it goes like this there's a there's a machine that sends out photons in two directions and the further they go they remain in connection they remain in correl ated with each other non-local reality is present that's a huge piece in paranormal stuff uh telepathy Clairvoyance and so forth so that means that our physical world our seemingly physical world which is supposed to be separate from the inner world the day that memo went out to reality apparently the UFO phenomenon didn't get the memo psychic phenomena didn't get the memo that they're not supposed to be real so uh the mystery is how could these photons they're not supposed to be able to remain connected and the thing and yet they are they do continue to influence each other at vast differences by the way I write in the book about how the best efforts were made this can't be happening there must be something wrong with the mechanism there must be something wrong with the device there must be a secret coding that these molecules have anything to defeat the idea of nonlocality why is that such a big issue is it's because our entire Paradigm is based on uh on the materialist premise so there gets as as Thomas [ __ ] the author of this wonderful book called the structure of scientific revolutions he described as you're you know you use the word you do a show called strange paradigms well he popularize the term Paradigm Paradigm Shift the sense in which a world viw will hold it seems coherent logical comprehensive until various anomalies emerge things that don't quite fit the Paradigm the first thing that scientists do in the process of normal science within an existing framework okay we check out that parad that excuse me that anomaly that anomaly was probably something to do with our measurements must have been the way we set up the exam the test uh the the clinical trials we were in they try to eliminate or account for the anomalies some anomalies are simply procedural they have to do with poor design and methods of studies but there are some anomalies that don't for example the near-death experience is really far along in terms of mainstream science began to take a look at this because reports for example someone comes back from surgery they brain they they were uh dead dead for all attension purposes clinically Dead uh Flatline brain heartbeat uh stopped and they come back they survive they come back to the body and the doctor will say well I'm ready now to talk with you about your prognosis since the anesthesia is worn off and the patient will say I already know the prognosis I overheard you talking with Dr Smith in the other wing of the hospital this morning you were wearing that tie that you're still wearing now and that spot you spilled mayonnaise on that by the way outside of this building on the roof there's a tennis shoe these are real anecdotes of real experiences the doctors who heard that you know their jaw drops to the floor how did you how would you know such who told you who overheard the conference I heard it I left my body I died I went to heaven the most impressive researchers Christina now in the near-death experience are people are doctors who started out as Skeptics materialists but one time after another one experience after another they had these Encounters of nonlocal uh non-local perceptions that are not supposed to be be possible and again the the the near-death experience just didn't get the memo that it's not supposed to happen it's not supposed but that's an anomaly so it's another [ __ ] in the armor of the materialist worldview so there's not going to be a sudden replacement of the current Paradigm the New York Times is not going to announce new paradigm arrives scientists Scurry for cover try to nail down their funding sources it's a very slow procedure but increasingly there is a new generation of researchers across various Fields who have experienced with the evidence on psychedelics for example or who have practiced meditation who have experientially found their way into Consciousness research Consciousness inquiry change the sense in which you can change your Consciousness through deliberate uh efforts and and practices so that's a long answer to uh we're not going to find I think the ultimate secrets to this phenomenon without some fundamental revision in a worldview that that that that places Consciousness in a central way it is always exciting to have scientists get on the bandwagon doing the research collecting the data but nothing really beats a firsthand experience and you've had your own near-death experience you've seen strange things before and so for you do you think in your opinion that solidifies this phenomenon more for you than the data well it does and I'll tell you a personal story about this you may you may have had this yourself as a journalist i i i for quite a while because I did mainstream stories and mainstream journalism it's it's it's generally the the case that you bring most journalism is not first person uh I mean you can begin you can begin a journalistic story by saying I was I found myself at a cocktail party in Washington DC and I didn't expect to see Senator Smith okay that's that's that's that's a but in in with with a phenomenon like this I I labored very hard in my early research and in my first book not to bring in firstperson experience because I held to a certain a very literal definition of objectivity I should write about the phenomenon as something out there and I interpret it through through my own filters but I I wouldn't want to bring my own experience in because that makes me susceptible to being a having a predisposition maybe to believe anyway with this book something shifted my new book The the UFO Paradox in the process of writing it and seeing the profound uh struggles that that contactees and experiencers go through including in the Zimbabwe sighting the school children there I write about and how they were told that didn't happen you didn't see what you say you saw that just that negation so in the process of writing this book I said you know Keith you have kept your story about your own near-death experience out of your writing you kept your your childhood experiences that essentially were mystical awareness uh recognitions illuminations that were completely unexpected unpracticed unsought openings into a larger sense of reality you've kept that out of the story maybe it's time to bring it in youve reached a stage of your life where you can and you can you can tell a richer story and so by telling your own experience so yes I think it does at some point U being willing especially with these controversi IAL uh subjects to be willing to site your own experience and and in the process of citing other people I think of of Professor Gary Nolan at Stanford who is probably on the verge of getting a a pullit surprise eventually himself he's really top top shelf guy in immunology and related stuff Brain Brain Research he's also come forward and says I've had I had childhood experiences of the UFO phenomena that's Brave it also gives him a wider framework he doesn't say I I think it's this everything about every Claim about the phenomenon is real because I have my own childhood experience that's not how it works it's to say why would I exclude my own in the name of some quest for credibility who who who do we Empower when we set up this standard when we have to convince the authorities that this stuff is credible tell the truth tell reality as it's reported and that is the best that's the best way that's that's that's what journalism about is about and it's what my my classroom teacher in the sixth grade she said you could be a a scientist what's a scientist scientist doesn't rule out data in advance if they get findings the job is to interpret those finding how could reality be behaving this way that's a second question you don't dismiss the results although it's a common it's a common response that's what happened to Galileo he said guess what folks the Earth orbits the sun he got a knock on the door from the Vatican which was in charge of those kind of decisions and those kind of reality calls stop saying that stop saying it he said you don't have to take my word for it I'm doing what's called empiricism empirical meth come look through my telescope and famously the Vatican said no we're not going to look through your telescope one more time if you continue to make this claim that the Earth orbits the sun rather than vice versa will put you in under house arrest he continued to make the claim and they placed him under house arrest but at least they didn't burn at the stake like they did to geodo Bruno who posited famously and well how controversially that there might be other other universes there might be other star systems wow is that really worth a death sentence at that time it was I'm not saying that's what UFO researchers face now but there is a phenomenon of debunkers who pretend to be genuine Skeptics and open to the research but they really not they're not they're not evil people but they dismissively uh use ridicule and Scorn to say in effect these events can't be happening as they're reported the abductions can't be real because we know from the laws of science some wonderful category that this isn't possible that's not scientific thinking folks that's some kind of crowd control that's closer to religion at its worst so one of the things I've concluded is that that same mindset of dogmatic dismissal sometimes it's the religious folk who behave that way other times it's scientific folk and other times it's just the normal human response this stuff challenges our fundamental assumptions and as you know that that is that can create very strong psychological defense reactions it definitely can and jumping out of that Paradigm from that Dogma that Foundation that you created for yourself it can be scary and it takes courage to jump out of it and while it might sound a little silly in all reality it does re Quire courage to say I was wrong when I came back from my near-death experience in my 20s I want to let you know that as you know from the book uh Raymond Moody had written his famous book Life After Life which put the the near-death experience on the map in terms of its stages going out of the body facing immediate sense of existential death mortality uh leaving the body seeing the body from a usually from above seeing other people seeing the body and then some kind of display of an afterlife experience some downloading of information including a Life review the the capacity to relive your entire life it seem in a matter of seconds and grasp deep connections and implications so I came back I I did not have the the famous you know the the classic it is not your time Keith you must go back I didn't get that if it if it was said as such I didn't hear it I just came back after struggling in the way oh by the way this is a drowning experience near drowning experience off the coast of Hawaii let me specify that so I uh I was fighting the waves and I was certain I died I I I remember looking down at my body and leaving my body through the back of my head I'd never had a out of- Body Experience had never heard of out of- body experience I was a real virgin with terms of the larger metaphysical stuff so I didn't come contaminated with expectations I didn't have childhood education about the nature of heaven we weren't a particularly religious family we were the kind of family that felt it was good for good people to be seen going to church we were not a religiously devout family so I came back back inside this body sent uh made it to a Cove that was calm with two dolphins just I offer that as a detail two dolphins seemingly escorting me my friends came out pulled me onto the shore noticed I had cuts and scrapes and they were worried about maybe perhaps a concussion or something but I had greater Lucidity I was more Lucid in that moment I said did you guys see all that and I was referring to the seemingly Celestial Heavenly stuff and I should add one more detail that makes it that made it really powerful while I was out of my body and while I was convinced oh dead isn't dead this is what death is I'm I'm dead I'm going away it's okay I've never felt more calm or Serene or tranquil by way I don't recommend you go to near-death try try to evoke a near-death experience because you can have that sense that reality is a safe place without that harrowing experience there's something about the trauma that really brings it into view in any case I had friends on the shore especially one named Mary who was saying to our another friend of ours why didn't Keith listen I told him the waves were too too Fierce I told him it was too rough and dangerous why didn't Keith listen I heard that from wherever my Consciousness had become the sense of of no boundary ultimate boundless conscious I heard Mary so I said to Mary if you will I went to Mary uh and and this is to say there was no here or there but I told Mary it's okay I'm fine you're fine life is fine I won't be back but it's all F Well she didn't hear this I I heard her talk I said well that seems to be the way when you've left you can hear them but they can't see or hear you so I survived made it you know we were all on vac vaction we rented a house and that night I you know recovered and we watched movies and had soup or something like that then next day I told my friend Mary could you go for a walk with me I want to tell you something she goes sure I said I and said we went for a walk I can still see the beautiful Hawaiian foliage and she said I said I heard what you said on the beach yesterday she said what do you mean why didn't you listen well I told you it was too rough it's too dangerous I repeated did all that to her Christina I watched the blood drain out of her face because we were both in our 20s buddies we were there as a whole group we didn't we had not thought deeply about the nature of Consciousness but we both knew that if that experience was possible if I could hear her voice on the beach which was no louder than this as she was talking to her friend my body was 200 yards out the the deafening sounds thunderous sounds of the Waves trust me I didn't hear her from my body so we both knew that this the game board that we take as reality is not the full story and we had conversations for the rest of her life because she passed away some years ago we talked about death as being the deepest fear fear of not existing probably being the heart of all fears like you know we have a relationship girlfriend boyfriend it's we're going through a breakup it's almost like we won't exist anymore without the relationship it's like country music you know tells us this all the time I can't live without you baby well that that is a a small example of the deeper fear I might someday not exist what I learned from my near-death experience I came back with having let just I can't say I let go of fear I came back with no fear death was no longer a fearsome thing so anyway that is another profound experience I decided to bring into the book as as a subtext it's not a major theme the book is primarily about the UFO phenomenon but I decided to draw the parallels between the near-death and the UFO experience and let it all unfold and let readers see the The View that I had come to see myself and in so many ways it's actually very important to share your own personal experiences just to add that little extra blanket to the entire thing because like yourself for a long time I never wanted to share any of my personal encounters or sighting so I felt like it just takes away from the research right but I think as the years progress and you continue moving forward you think to yourself no it doesn't take away it actually it actually adds to it in so many ways and in these conversations in these philosophical conversations that you might have had with Mary talking about UFOs the Paranormal and Consciousness did you ever talk to her about how the the UFO phenomenon ultimately represents a call from the cosmos as you had mentioned in your book you we did it's funny how I I I I contined to follow the UFO phenomenon and I've come to realize that was I wasn't ready to write a book about my own near-death experience or my own childhood openings into a larger reality I may do that I may write an entirely firstperson book A Memoir of the Memoir of my experiences with the unknown Etc but I um I came I've come to feel that I I CH to CH I decided to stay with the UFO phenomena as a way to explore a parallel to what I had been through so I could in some sense process what I had been through with a neighbor uh by way of being a researcher in a neighboring or adjacent phenomena the near death I mean excuse me the UFO phenomena so I've actually never seen a UFO I've never had a classic there's never seen anything in the sky that didn't seem to belong there although as you know you look at the sky that's some people don't do we don't do it sit outside this time of year especially get a lawn chair get a cap with a a a visor and a cool drink watch the sky for 20 minutes 30 minutes an hour the sky is not a place it's an activity it is filled it's a constantly changing phenomena so to say I've never seen anything in the sky that didn't belong there what is Sky I mean those are the kind of questions that come back to a person who am I what is it that I'm aware what I I'm aware that I am there's something it is like to be living this moment that's the classic existential sense of wonder and awe so yeah I talked with Mary a lot she wanted she asked me a lot as we as we continue to be friend you know what's what are you finding out about the U of OA and how does it what is it that draws you and what what are you learning and tell yeah so I constantly was regaling her I give her great credit in the book and I was with her when she passed away she had a had an illness and she called me one day to to say hey Keith it's Mary I I know I know your number she said um I wanted to tell you I'm I'm sick again she was having a relapse I said I've I've heard how's it going she said I'm dying and we were great friends we had a lot of laughter I said well how's that going for you she said oh she laughed she go oh you know me I'm I'm nothing if not diligent I said yes death with diligence I think they give awards for that so as usual we laugh she Saidi wonder if you could come see me and I knew she was saying could you come see me for the last time and I said Ure when are when would you like would tomorrow work she goes well yeah if if it's not on your you know if you have time I said I have time to come see you it's on my schedule I'll see you so went to went to see her and she was in the final days of of of an illness so terminal and so forth and we were talking about everything finally oh so she said to me that day she said you heard me on the beach he wanted me to say one more time about the years orou heard me that day on the beach something like a statement something like a question and I said yes I did she said and you're still not afraid and by that she meant that I had lost fear of D I said I'm still not afraid and her face sort of softened I said Mary you remember these T the times in your life when everything was miserable things couldn't get worse but you still trusted in being you trusted being she said yes and her eyes lit up smiled and so did mine I said I leaned forward and I said keep that up keep that up keep trusting in being that was my way of saying not I didn't say oh I my own based on my own experience I'm convinced Consciousness survives physical death that's the sort of philosophical way that's the same and I believe it does by the way in some way that's remarkable I said just keep that up keep trusting in being the you you'll be some this will never end life doesn't end it'll take on a new form and we had talked about that many times so I bring that in too so I did not intend to write this to be to provide hope and inspiration that I'm hearing from people that that part of the book is as interesting to them as as my accounts of working with Lawrence Rockefeller on the uh efforts to get disclosure on Roswell or John Mack the abductions researcher at Harvard or going down to see Calvin Parker in the Pascal Gula famous abduction um and spent I visited him the year before he died so my book covers comes at this stuff from many directions and that's the way it is and that has to be one of the more exciting things about your book is is exactly what you mentioned you have all of these different factors in working in they're playing literally like the chapters are playing with one another and I think it is just very diverse compared to just a structured here are a bunch of cases here are witnesses I think that's what makes the book so unique and it's also very interesting to even have you talk about the mythology as well the trickster element or the trickster entity Skinwalker wrench I mean there's just so much going on and yet it's all very valuable information there wasn't one page that was wasted it it all had they all worked together and with this phenomenon which which I think is so exciting really is the correlation between UFOs the Paranormal Cryptids Consciousness all these different things that when you start you're like this stuff is so easy I got this few weeks and you're thinking this is a lot more complex than I could have ever imagined and it's just it's really invigorating to do the research in this topics I'm putting that as a plural it's so many different things and what I wanted to ask you next was what connection do you make between UFO encounters and the concept of the dayon from ancient Greek uh philosophy well that's a rich topic the demon or daon is uh was we know it from Socrates he referred to Consulting his Dion which which cons there's many ways to talk about it's a sense of of of a guide a spirit it uh it's maybe correlates with the unconscious it's a the Dion is a part of who we are that doesn't correlate with who we think we are most of the time he famously asked his dime on Socrates should he fight the charges of the of the Greek uh authorities he was charged with corrupting the youth by teaching them to ask the kind of questions we're talking about not about what's in the sky but what's what's real self-inquiry the unexamined life is not worth living Socrates said so uh he uh was found guilty and his uh followers including Plato said you're going to fight the charges aren't you he said no no I've made my point and he we understand he he had consulted his Dion had reached a negotiated settlement it was time to to move on so the diamon is I you touched on it earlier I it's a the dime on is that sense we have when there's a call there is I got a call in the sixth grade my calling was to continue the kind of pursuit that I had begun Martin Scorsese the filmmaker let me give you a great example of the dime on he was a sickly child uh I forget what his disease was but when his friends were playing outside on the New York neighborhood you know Hopscotch and all the other games he was generally inside the house probably a congestive lung issue or something like that he uh watched his friends from the out what he became very good at was drawing cartoons of his friends doing doodling drawing well so what did what did scorsi go on to do he became one of the greatest filmmakers in history through that limitation the idea of the dimeon is sometimes it is very much through the limitation for example an alien abduction nobody wants an alien abduction but something has chose some interaction has happened and it goes to to the very Heart Of Your Existence you you you are confident that you were taken out of your bed and conducted some kind of medical examination um I don't I don't in any way take a light-hearted approach but there's something about that and that is your work now that is your calling to make that meaningful for yourself and there's another example of the dime on a young a young a young person named Ella Fitzgerald young black girl in New York went to a talent show when she was you know 12 or 14 and the announcer said ladies and gentlemen we're going to now have a younger elit Gerald is going to dance for us and so expect she came expecting to dance who knew Ella Fitzgerald was a good dancer then they nouner said no no Ellis changed your mind ell gonna sing for us ell sang that day Ella Fitzgerald if you don't know who Ella Fitzgerald was viewers find her on Google she one of the great vocalists black vocalists of our time the Dion gives us some Freedom some from freedom to Manu maneuver she came ready to dance she thought that was her thing but another party said no I'm G to sing that became her calling so follow the call I I call the UFO phenomenon and I add paranormal phenomenon the near-death experience these are all callings from the cosmos to expand our maps of reality I think that's what they're really here to do it's a if as if parts of reality that were once off this off the off the um out of our sights are now coming is it is it an emergence of the unconscious in a deepest sense the collective unconscious maybe that that's where phenomena these phenomena are coming from dimensions of reality that have always been here but have been outside our frame of Consciousness and they may be coming the UFOs May indeed be coming from other star systems that's the ET hypoth I don't dismiss that I simply want to make that one of many hypotheses so a call that we get to follow a certain path is only a monologue until we respond so I describe how I responded to my own call but I uh I'm also make a case it's our challenge to respond to this phenomenon and ask what it's here it's it's it's it's here with a message it's here to with information that it's here with news of the universe are we willing to hear what its message is and respond intelligently because I think there is a right of passage that these phenomena represent what the right of passage or initiation is about I don't know but I think as Joseph Campbell the great mythographer described mythologist and mythographer in his famous book the hero with a thousand faces he said it is very often the case that ordinary people get called from their normal circumstances to go on a quest most of us have some sense by the time we reach middle life there that there's a quest that we've been on or that we want to go on we change our career we change our relationship we give up being a high price lawyer we want to do sculpture all kinds of things and our friends say that makes no sense that's not a good career path well maybe career is not the only framework at some level the soul has to be heard so I'm saying this is a call to the the soul of our time to the animamundi the um Soul at large so the soul of the world if you if you will so I I take a a pretty big and expansive approach but it's all evidence-based I follow the evidence where it leads I just acknowledge there are different kinds of evidence in that case would you consider that certain people are almost pre-selected to have these experience and encounters or do you think everyone has equal opportunity to see something strange or to experience something unique okay I think it's both and but I'm not trying to avoid the question in one sense I think there are capacities that human beings have have that are widely distributed I think for example paranormal psychic functioning is is is widespread it's latent you know it's it's implicit it's not part of most people's lives but there are these experiences I mentioned the phone rings you've been thinking of someone it's it's not someone you see regularly or talk to and it's someone 20 years in your history you're at the grocery store and you uh you have the strange feeling you're being stared at and you look up or look behind you and someone is staring it's nothing malevolent but it's just in in a moment they were looking at you you look at them and you exchange a smile the point is you knew in some way that you were being stared at turned out to be right that's extra sensory perception so I think it's widespread I I have a whole chapter called who do we think we are and I don't mean it in the rhetorical sense although I wanted to play you who do you think you are young man who do we think we are anyway what does it mean to be a human being and I I make a strong case for these capacities extra normal larger capacities are part of who we are now as for things like abductions is there a are are some people predisposed um to have the abduction uh what are what would be the factor I know there are some there studies going on about MRI using and the MRI technology to see if anything about the brains of of abductees is is different from non- abductees I told totally dig that kind of approach empirical efforts Gary Nolan again at Stanford is looking into a particular part of the brain called the paman uh and and and changes that seem to go on in that part of the brain in contact e or people who've had UFO encounters including in the Tik Tock case so I'm all for medical the medical part I'm for the mythological and the medical they're all parts of reality I I say why would we why would we rope off off with yellow you know you're a crime scene investigation you rope off the area why would we rope it off or with the yellow tape to exclude whole Avenues of of evidence what sense does that make if if if what do sense does that make if our goal is really to get to the heart of what's ultimately real we'd include all the evidence I'll give one more example Charles Darwin came up with some pretty profound thinking about the Origin of Species but he began as a British naturalist who would go out with his napsack he would collect fossils and stones and bones and and he would you know put them in his bag and go home he didn't pick up a fossil and say oh this fossil doesn't fit the other fossils I think I'll leave it on the ground no it didn't fit the other fossils it was a different kind of fos he kept it and went home in his library or laboratory whatever he had and he and he did the Deep work okay there's a larger pattern than I thought and the birds migrate from this Island to that Island he came to understand how life proliferates and he didn't do it by saying well I don't think that piece of data makes sense what he was doing didn't make sense it was very controversial he was challenging the Deep religious thinking the biases of his time so as Galileo was when he said what he said about how the heavens moved and where we are uh he he paid the price I haven't I can't claim I've paid any price for doing what I've done so I encourage people to to explore ask the big questions and live the biggest life you can and that is honestly such great advice like yes I've put that on a t-shirt Keith and I I'll buy one because that is such brilliant advice and it's so true ask the questions ask the big questions and ask questions that maybe other people might be a little too scared to ask because of rejection or who knows what the worst answer you can get is no that's it like there's no other real consequences today unlike Mr Galileo he's under house arest until he passed but today it's it's a little bit different I think we have more free range to be able to ask tough questions and not receive the significant consequences like a few hundred years ago something to talk about is that we've mentioned science we we touched a little bit on philosophy you also touched just a little bit on um psychology but how do you think when it comes to UFO sightings and encounters how does it affect people psychologically from your research well the first the these are very difficult experiences the abductions what whatever is going on and by the way there's a new there's a new U there's a growing there's a maturing within the community the UFO community so that the U because the term abduction did not Define the full range it it it Define some of the experiences very well but the John Mack in particular at Harvard found that many people at through this experience called abduction which can feel harrowing extremely difficult opens to transformative potentials but on that point alone the expectation uh the the with the debunkers or even fair-minded critics will say the Abduction the abduction phenomenon is a psych it's a pathology these people what they have in common they believe they were abducted but they have some unknown psychological melees well John Mack was the first abduction researcher who was really came from the field of mental health he was a psychiatrist he had worked with trauma victims in other areas of his research so he knows how he knew how trauma worked and he he steadfastly maintained that there's no pre-existing psychological pathology that defines an abductee now do abductees go on to have difficulty in their lives psychological difficulties well if you believe you've been abducted just as if you've gone through a natural disaster like a hurricane they will be some Readjustment there'll be some difficulty coming to terms with it um I often say to people who ask me privately they said you know you've had your own experiences Keith um should I come forward and tell others about mine and and my response to that Christina is yes don't keep it up bottled up entirely in yourself I I talk about Emily trim a young student at the Zimbabwe School the aerial school who kept her experience bottled up for a long time until circumstances enable her to come forward and say this happened this is this is my work now to resolve and live into this so I I say to people yes you should tell someone don't keep it botted up but don't hold a news conference don't go on TV necessarily unless that's unless that is your calling there are people who do take that path like Whitley streber in his famous book communion and he has in some respects paid the price for being as candid as he was in terms of his credibility but I've never heard Whitley say that he regrets it he sees himself as an Explorer so psychologically these are diff difficult experiences I know from my near death experience the um as I said the the work of Worman Moody was not yet famous so no one was ready to hear me when I said I died and I came back that my friends Christina looked at me when I would say that in even in Hawaii they'd never heard of the near-death experience either they hadn't seen Oprah they hadn't seen the popularization of it yet and they said you need you need therapy you you'll come back to earth you didn't go you didn't die that's you don't die and come back but you think you did so and I quickly learned I said oh this won't go well if I talk about it casually so I became uh very clear that there was a certain sense in which keeping this private is not a denial there's a kind of keep it private that is a denial like if I keep it quiet maybe it will not have happened well that isn't that doesn't generally doesn't work right denial as a strategy in terms of reality something happened opening to that it happened and getting help you need is what you need to do but there is a way in which keeping it private can serve a function because during the time that I stopped talking about it casually you know I didn't go to parties and say you want to hear about my near-death experience no because people very often did not instead I was I had the Good Fortune of getting to know Dr Kenneth ring who like Moody was one of the uh renowned researchers and I sort of funny he said I'm interested in the UFO stuff and you'd like to know about the near death experience so he he became a kind of Mentor for me around my near-death experience helped me process it and I became a teacher for him of sorts about the UFO phenomena and Ken Ring went on to write a book title of which escapes me but it's Dr Kenneth ring r G about the interface between near death and UFO experiences so you know when you follow your call you meet people you wouldn't have met I would not have gotten a call from Lawrence Rockefeller asking me to help uh approach the Clinton Administration to De declassify some of the Roswell stuff so you know when you when you enter the call Joseph Campbell talks about this in his hebro journey when the journeyer goes on the questers The Call to Adventure one will find allies and one will find adversaries but it's deeply about the quest and I I I strongly I strongly recommend it it's not on most UFO uh book lists but if you want to delve deeply into the UFO phenomenon add Joseph Campbell's hero with a thousand faces word mentioned about UFOs but it's about how to respond to a larger call from Life Keith we just have a few minutes left and what I like to do with my guests is do a fun speed round of fun questions so are you ready I'm oh boy let's is this the lightning like the lightning round it is it is so here it is in your wildest imagination What is the most outrageous reason that aliens might be visiting Earth my most outrageous reason to to show us that we are part of a much more much larger magical reality like in the in the in the films that are called magical realism the assumption is that reality is infused with magic unlike Harry Potter where everything is Magic and everything is fantasy it's a whole world magical realism says that in the midst of ordinary reality the magic appears so in without going into any particular interpretation it's it's as if we have tried for 300 years in our scientific method to write off other forms of intelligence they too didn't get the memo and they're back to say we're here we've always been here you wonder who we are we wonder who you are I write about that in the book we want to know where they're from and what their purpose is and I can imagine the alien say well we have the same questions for you where are you from what is your purpose wow what if we looked at it that way o I like that next one what's the most bizarre UFO Theory you've ever heard that secretly made you laugh oh boy the okay I wasn't so Secret I laugh at the idea that that we have reached we've have treaties with aliens and we've allowed them to abduct us we they could do abductions they could abduct us for a certain period for a while certain number of abductions per year would be allowed I I kind of laugh because I said but based on the very phenomenology of the abduction experience they don't need our permission the idea like what would be the what would be the grounds of such an agreement so I don't so that that's the one the treaties with the aliens they occupy a larger space if you will and they're trying to beckon us into that larger space too they're trying to show us you occupy a larger space than you know humans human nature your own Nature has more Dimensions than you acknowledge open up to it see what you find out I think I think we're meeting on Common Ground Christina I think the this phenomenon and humans are both meeting on the grounds of our of of of this being a larger Earth if you will a larger Earth than we realize metaphorically speaking we are coming ashore to a larger Earth if you discovered that UFOs were actually time traveling future humans what's the first question you'd ask them about the future I would say what happened to us such that you are our future beings because they're not a very vital crew these little Grays if if they are future humans something went terribly amiss I see robust people every day in life I see people running marathons we're about to begin the Olympics I mean we have problems in the human realm but there is a Vitality you know and a robustness and a complexity to human nature the H the body didn't do very well if the Grays are our descendants coming back they they must wonder what what happened too it's not to it's not to say that the Grays don't have their own thing but anyway the idea if if the Grays are us from the future something I'm interested in what what steps happened that we the human human animal became the gray reptiles o I have one more for you if you could genetically combine any two Earth animals to create the perfect alien pet what would you choose oh boy I would that's a big I would something about a Golden Retriever and an owl I'll just let that I'll just let that sit there okay so does does this creature have fur or feathers both both that's what makes it remarkable uh and I think there is almost something fur-like with uh with the owl feathers I've seen some owls up close and um so yeah I think it's both it wouldn't be either or we got to get Beyond either or binary thinking Keith thank you so much for being on the show today where can people find you online and where can they get your new newest book the UFO Paradox my website is Thompson large.com Thompson withth the pge.com the book is in bookstores I found one the other day in the religion section it's interesting where if you do a book on UFOs there tend not to be UFO sections in most bookstores uh maybe Mysteries or the Paranormal but U so book your local bookstore amazon. com Barnes & Noble online it's a publish there's a print book an ebook and within a couple of weeks the uh audio book is coming out we didn't get it time quite right the publisher had some technical issues so there will be an audiobook for those who like to listen and I narrated it which was quite an adventure going into a studio and lots of hours going into making a a a book an audio book so available in all those formats yes and those links will be in the description box below Kei thank you thank you thanks for inviting me if you enjoy the strange and the Mysterious UFOs the Paranormal encrypted this channel is for you so make sure to subscribe as I do three videos right here every single week and hit that notification Bell so you do not miss any of the bonus content I post right here

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