Whilst it’s not the focus of my parapsychological research, I’m interested in what we call in the trade the ‘survival hypothesis’. In other words, does our consciousness, what makes us us, live on after we die? The evidence for this comes in a number of guises, for example, near-death experiences, research into supposed reincarnation cases, and apparitions (ghosts!). But there is also intriguing evidence to suggest that mediums (some of them at least) can contact those departed from this world. But data on their own is not always convincing. (Try talking to a climate change denier.) So whilst I am intrigued by the evidence about mediumship, the raw statistics don’t quite persuade me. And some first-hand accounts suggest that some mediums can be startlingly accurate. So twice in my life I’ve decided to give this a whirl.
The first time was around 2016, about a year after my dad died. I wasn’t particularly grieving and I had no massive desire to get back in touch with him but nevertheless I decided on a bit of a whim to try out an ‘evidential reading’. This is specifically designed to show us that people really do survive beyond their physical death through a medium relating specific information from the afterlife they couldn’t possibly know without direct contact from someone deceased. So I booked a sitting over Skype.
To be honest, at the time it was mostly underwhelming. I resolved to say as little as possible (mainly just yes and no) to avoid the potential for cold reading, which is where the supposed medium fishes for information without really being in contact with anyone. Most of the things the medium got right were not that impressive – “I see your grandmother and grandfather in spirit”. (I doubt whether many people my age still have living grandparents.) And I remember saying no a lot too.
However, there was one piece of information that I wasn’t at the time able to verify or deny. This went something along the lines of an uncle of my mother named something like Bob or Bill who had gone to Australia but died soon afterwards. After the reading, I asked my mother about this. She said, “oh yes, that was poor uncle Bill. He went to Australia as a ten pound pom but died three weeks later in a train crash. It was so sad.” I knew nothing about this beforehand and, superficially at least, it seemed amazingly accurate. I say superficially because, unfortunately, I didn’t record the session, or even make notes, so I can’t know whether my memory of what the medium said was reliable. This is a common problem in such situations – it often happens that we’re subconsciously inclined to change our memory of what happened in order to make the reading seem more accurate than it really was.
So I always thought I’d like to try again at some point, preferably with someone who has a good track record. This opportunity arose just recently. I was incredibly moved by someone I met this summer who had lost her partner in tragic circumstances and found that she was not only able to communicate directly with her partner’s spirit but also with other deceased people. I felt that this person had real credibility – she had an impressive academic and professional background but I also believed her on a personal level. So, I thought I’d ask her to give me a reading. (I’m not shy and if you don’t ask you don’t get!) Unfortunately, because of practical reasons that wasn’t possible but she did provide me with recommendations of other mediums who they said were the ‘real deal’. So I went and made an appointment.
Here’s what happened. After the reading (conducted online), I felt somewhat similar to my first experience. In other words, that the information was mostly too vague to be interesting or it was just plain wrong. But there were a couple of parts I felt to be intriguing. For example, my brother who had passed had supposedly ‘come through’. After the session I was left wondering whether my brother really had been ‘there’ speaking with me via this medium.
But what was different this time, was that I made a recording. And it was a revelation. What I had felt immediately afterwards to be accurate elements of the reading were, upon review, rather less than impressive. Here’s the part that led to the medium concluding that the spirit of my deceased brother was present:
Medium: “There is this gentleman. … I don’t know if it’s suicide or an accidental passing is what it feels like. Do you understand … somebody who’s crossed over like that?”
Me: “Yes, possibly.”
“But it is a male, correct, Sir?”
“Yes.”
“Want to double check. … he feels like he’s close to you. … it almost feels like [a] friendship, even potentially brother feeling. I’m not saying that he’s a brother but I just feel it. So do you understand a brother or somebody that was like a friend that’s crossed over like this?”
“[Pause] Yes, a brother.”
“So know that your brother stepped forward.”
I don’t know about you, but that feels like fishing to me. Then the medium was trying to ascertain whether he died by suicide or by accident. He said:
“You understand that he did struggle with a suicide or accidental overdose or something … accidental. Is that correct, Sir?”
“Yes.” [To be honest, there weren’t many other options!]
“I do feel like this was accidental because he keeps on talking about his mind. So do you understand that he dealt with bipolar or depression here? Because it doesn’t feel like things were always right here if that makes sense.”
“Um. I don’t think so, no.”
“They show me the head, it does represent that. Are you OK with me diving into this kind of stuff?”
“Sure.”
“The thing is here it feels, when they show me the head, it kind of reminds me if there was either a potential hanging or something related with the hanging. Does that make sense to you sir?”
“No.”
There were other tell-tale signs of cold-reading:
“OK, so there’s this intriguing thing here. I … how do I say this? I know your name is Mike, but I’m feeling drawn to the letter J, so I don’t know if it’s a connection with John or George in the family is what it feels like. So how do we connect with the name George or John in your family, Sir?”
“Well, my second name’s John.”
“OK, I feel that.”
Which bore an uncanny resemblance to a public reading, fortunately caught on camera, from the medium Clinton Baptiste, famed in Bolton and beyond.
Was the medium I saw a fraud? I don’t know. Perhaps he gives better readings for others. And indeed, when I made it clear that I wasn’t that impressed, he didn’t charge me. Which at least shows some integrity. Does this mean that all mediumship readings are just products of cold reading and wishful thinking? I don’t know of course, but I don’t think so. Stories such as this one from a sceptic who clearly had a better experience than me mean I might be third time lucky…
Featured image by Scott Rodgerson on Unsplash
