SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Transform Your Mind Radio Hour and Podcast, the number one self-improvement podcast for women in the world. This is Life Coach Rudy Young. And in my book, Out of the Snares, a story of hope and encouragement, I share my journey from being born in poverty in Guyana to having abundance in America. And I did it by being committed to Kenai, which is constant and never-ending improvement every day. Looking for personal growth, let's do it. Each week, I bring you guests and one-on-one coaching sessions to help you transform your mind so that you can transform your life. Welcome back to the Transform Your Mind to Transform Your Life Radio, Podcast, and Television Show. I'm your host, Life Coach Rennie Young, and sitting in the guest chair today is Reverend Dr. Karen E. Herrick. Karen and I are going to be talking on the topic: what is the vagus nerve and how does it affect our spirituality? Okay, I love the vagus nerve. I know that that is basically how I relax, that's how I get out of fire flight, that's how I heal my body, but I've never heard it connected to spirituality. So I'm gonna love our conversation. I couldn't wait for this talk today with Dr. Karen. So welcome, Reverend Dr. Karen. I know lots of names.

SPEAKER_01 1:39

Thank you so much. I'm so happy to be here.

SPEAKER_00 1:42

You're very welcome. I'm happy to have you here too. All right, so let me give you a short, a short bio in the form of an intro. Um uh Reverend Dr. Karen E. Herrick finished her interdisciplinary doctoral major at Union Institute and University Cincinnati, Ohio in 2008 in philosophy. After having a profound spiritual experience during holotropic record training, Karen Herrick became extremely interested in the connection between the body and the spirit and how we can use this information to help people heal. Karen did extensive research into spiritual psychology, spiritual phenomena, and titled her heavily researched thesis, Naming Spiritual Experience. She has shared her clinical experience for 30 years in private practice and by lecturing on dysfunctional, addictive homes, dissociation, and grief and loss from a different perspective. She is now researching the potential benefits of medianship, knowing that grief is primarily resolved when bereaved can recognize their continued spiritual bonds with the deceased. I hope we get to touch on that today. But um yes, so yes, I'm gonna enjoy our conversation. I want to concentrate a lot today on um spirituality and um uh the vagus nerve, but I hope we can get to spirituality and you know a little bit of afterlife and stuff. All right, so um we're gonna dive right in today. I'm very curious, you know, right off the bat, you mentioned that in your bio you you um you mentioned a profound spiritual experience during a holotropic breathwork training. Can you tell us what that is, number one, um, and why it formed the basis for your work in spirituality?

SPEAKER_01 3:47

Yes, I'd be happy to. Uh, holotropic breath work is a um phenomena that was founded by a doctor, um, Stan Gross, and um he was taking people years ago um in a hospital in Maryland and giving them LSD or ecstasy, and they were having uh spiritual experiences, and he was, you know, testing those, trying trying to find out some of the characteristics. And then that got to be no, no, you can't use LSD and ecstasy anymore in in these kinds of studies. So he founded this breath work um where they play music that activates your chakra system, which is an invisible system of energy that goes up your spinal column. And you have to be clairvoyant to see that. Um anyway, so I was at a conference up in Boston about children of alcoholics because that's what my practice started out to be. I worked with alcoholic families, and um I had, you know, you had it sitting there having a cup of tea, and somebody comes along and says, Oh, what do you think of the conference? And I love Claudia Black and all this stuff. She was an art therapist that helped kids. And they said, Well, if you like Claudia Black, you really like Jacqueline Small. I said, Really? I've never heard of her. Oh, well, she does holotropic breath work. Okay. So we just have 15 minutes and you never see the person again, right? And that's how things happen. And um, I love Jungian psychology, and Carl Jung says, chance rules, right? So you never know when it's gonna happen. And so I always tell people, you know, you half a life is showing up because lots of things could happen. Um, so anyway, about six months later, I get a brochure across my desk. Jacqueline Small is gonna be in Connecticut, and synchronistically, just happens to be the same week my daughter, uh, youngest daughter's going to sleep away camp. And so I can go, so I call them and they say, Well, yes, um, yes, it uh we are having this, but it's a nine-month program on transpersonal psychology, which is a psychology that allows uh for all kinds of experiences, not just when you're awake, um, and it costs five thousand dollars. So I said, Well, I don't have five thousand dollars, so they said, Well, there's a guaranteed student loan, and if you fill off the application, you'll get the the money. So, anyway, I do all that and I'm driving to Connecticut from New Jersey, which is a horrendous drive, especially in Connecticut, at five o'clock in the morning, and I'm thinking, What are you doing? You know, you could be home and you could have the whole house to yourself for a whole week, and I don't know. So I get to this, um it was a um a nunnery, uh former nunnery, and it was on uh beautiful um on the coast of Connecticut. And um I get there about nine o'clock, and this little nun says, Well, you're a little early. Would you like to go to your room and take a nap? And I I would because I was exhausted. So she said, You're in the lion swing, and I went to get my stuff, and she showed me, and it was I saw, right, L-I-O-N-S, and it it was L-Y-O-N-S, which was one of my great-great-grandmother's maiden names. So I thought, well, maybe I'm supposed to be here, right? But it was a little weird because when I first got there, there was a lady looking at this tree in the courtyard, and she was saying, in my in a past life, I think I was a tree like this. And I'm thinking, I don't, I don't know. I don't know what I did. So anyway, I take a nap and we have all kinds of educational stuff from Sunday until Wednesday morning when we're supposed to lay down and breathe. And so you lay down on you know, pillow and a blanket, and you have a partner in case you want a glass of water or something. The partner is supposed to help you. And and there were 21 people there at this training. I was one of 21. They had all breathed, I think, but two of us. And the one man that was my partner said he his hands and feet froze when this happened to him. And I said, Well, could you just let me go first? Because I don't want to have any preconceived idea. I just want to go first. Sure. So I went first. Now the instructions were it was a meditation, and then the at the end it was don't think, just breathe. Right. Okay. So I always do what education people tell me to do. So I really went into this. I'm breathing and breathing and and I'm having all kinds of nice feelings in my body, and oh, this is lovely, you know. And then all of a sudden I pull my feet up to the birthing position and I feel this breath come through my body, and it's not my breath. So I'm breathing, and this other breath is breathing, and I'm thinking, what is that? And then I thought, don't think, just breathe. So we breathe for a while. And then it started to get real hectic. And um, I asked my partner if he would push on my feet, and he didn't do it right, whatever that meant. So the trainers came over and they pushed on my feet just right, and the other trainer got behind my neck, and he said, Hold on my arms and just push. So I kept pushing and pushing and pushing, and I had this thought, where is my mother? And I thought to myself, why am I thinking that? Right? Don't think, just breathe. I just kept going. And then when it was all over, I just laid there and they said, I had my my hands like little fists around me, and they said that I look like this little baby because I had just experienced my original birth here on earth. So what I what I know is that it's harder to be born, I think, than it is to die, from all my research. Um, because we just we go up the vagus nerve out the top of our head, and gravity does not affect our spiritual body, and we just go when we die. So, anyway, um I thought this whole process had taken about 25 minutes, and it had taken four hours. So I lost touch with time and space, right? Which is what a spiritual experience is, one of the characteristics. And I I stood up and all these people that I thought had been so weird on Sunday, I felt this tremendous love for them, and I knew that we were connected, and I knew that all of us were connected to everybody in the world, and I knew there was a God. And up until then, um I had had this like American Indian idea that well, somebody something created nature and the wind, and you know, nature was it, and so I didn't believe in a in a higher power necessarily. So all of a sudden I know there's a God, and I feel all this awe and just tremendous love for everybody in the room and everybody else in the world. And then they say, then you're not supposed to talk to anybody, and you go in the next room and you draw a mandala drawing, which is a circle, and then you just draw in the circle, which is supposed to contain the chaos of whatever has come out of your unconscious, which I certainly had all this chaos, and um, so I drew, didn't know what was going on. I just drew a flower and the sun and the grass and um and then we were to go to lunch so that food could kind of ground you after this. So after that we came out and um everybody sat in a circle, and all of us that had breathed uh explained our picture, our mandala dry. And I I just showed it and um I didn't say that I had this breath come in my body because I listened and nobody else had a breath, right? So So I wasn't gonna be different. And plus you're a little disoriented because you've left the third dimension, you've gone into the fourth dimension, and you've come back.

SPEAKER_00 11:48

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 11:49

So um so Jacqueline Small said, Oh, oh, you've had a rebirth. That's a rebirth drawing.

SPEAKER_00 11:57

And I said, Oh, okay, that's it. And um I would have think that a rebirth drawing would have been um a a fetus or something, not not not um flowers in the sun. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 12:11

Like new life.

SPEAKER_00 12:13

Ah right.

SPEAKER_01 12:15

So okay. So then after you've done that, I I didn't feel very safe. Um I felt safe where I was, but everybody that night went out for pizza and a movie. I thought, no, no, no, I'm staying here. And then on Saturday I was supposed to drive and lead three other cars to Newark Airport. So about Friday I said, You better get it together. Whatever happened to you, you're gonna be able to figure it out. And um, of course, it took me about a year and a half um of studying and um and figuring out. But Bill Wilson, of the founder of AA, had had um um an uh uh spiritual experience in his um hotel not hotel room, his hospital room, when his doctor told him the next time you come here to to dry out, you're gonna go to a mental hospital. And Bill's I never was, uh you know, I'm not crazy, I'm not going to a mental hospital, but in the 1930s that's what they did to alcoholics. So he got down on his knees that night and prayed, if there is a God, please take away my desire to drink. And he said, What happened was a light filled the room and this uh air, this air went through him, not not breath, an air of spirit went through him. And so and he his desire to drink was gone. So I thought that's what happened. So then I just started calling it my Holy Spirit experience, but I didn't really tell anybody.

SPEAKER_00 13:42

You were able, you were able to drive home though. Oh yes, you were able to drive home. Wow. Journey Life Goals and Self-Care app is a personal growth and self-care app that helps you create goals and track your progress. Journey provides a daily devotional with educational and inspirational content. Journey allows you to save goals and use affirmation meditations to affirm your personal progress. Save personalized notes and categories of learning and improvement. Easily watch educational content across a spectrum of categories with recommended reading. There are also routines in the app to help with planning and organizing. Journey Life Goals and Self-Care app seeks to help people of all walks of life in their everyday life to maintain a sense of control through organization, personal development, and self-care while creating a sense of community through volunteering by giving a portion of your $4.99 monthly or $29.99 annual subscription to the Kids in Need Foundation and Refugees in Need. Download Journey, J-O-U-R-N-Y, Life Goals and Self-Care app on the Apple App Store or Google Play Store now. Now, the did that because you're now a reverent, and you mentioned before you didn't believe in in the higher power. So that's what started you to become a reverent?

SPEAKER_01 15:26

Yeah, after that, I went uh to this training in New York City that was started by a reverent, uh, a reverend, a priest, and a rabbi. And um, and they were teaching the different religions of the world, which I was just very interested in, you know, this uh, you know, is it does everybody have the same God? And um, so I really enjoyed that. And I wasn't gonna take the test and all that, I was just gonna take the classes, but then I decided, okay. So I became ordained. So like I could marry you and bury you, but I don't do that. I help people that really have a trouble with the fact that they were raised a certain way and they don't want to follow that, you know, those rituals anymore. And and so what's what do they want to keep? What do they want to kind of throw away? Um and it's been very helpful because most of the people that come to me will say they're not religious, they're spiritual. So so that's my story, and then then I start getting these really um all different kinds of clients that had all these different types of spiritual experiences. And um one client, like at the end of a session, so we call that therapist called that a doorknob issue. So as he's leaving, he says, Um, you know, I leave my body at night and I'm really concerned about how to get back in.

SPEAKER_00 16:46

Wow, what a closing, huh?

SPEAKER_01 16:51

So I thought, but see, I had just had this really weird thing, so I wasn't judging anybody's weird experience. So I said, Well, how do you usually get back in? And he said, Well, I just think about it and I'm back in. And that's how you get back in if you ever find yourself out there in your spiritual body. And so my news to everybody that's listening to this, or will be, is that humans have two bodies. We have a physical body where you and I are talking today, and then we have a spiritual body. And that is um that comes from an atom that is placed in utero when we are conceived, and the physical body grows around that atom. And so as we grow physically, the spiritual body grows. So you have this miniature of you that is growing inside of you, and um it is housed in your solar plexus in your body. So that's in your stomach. And um there's a cord that attaches um to your breastbone, which is called the silver cord. So when when you um die and go over to the other side, your soul has to go because your soul was not born, it was created. And so it has to go back up to the etheric world. Now, so gravity doesn't stop it because it just goes. Um but what I've figured out is you like the vagus nerve, but it's the tenth and longest nerve in your body, and it goes from the top of your head, comes down, goes around your neck, hits the amygdala, which is fight, flight, or frozen, and then goes down your uh spine into your heart and into your stomach. So Darwin said in the 1700s that this was your pneumogastric nerve, and that what happened was anything that would trigger you, the stomach was affected by a trigger. You know, you feel fear, and your stomach told your brain, danger, danger, and then uh then your heart rate went up. So I started studying the Vegas because the Dr. Porges, who had studied it for 40 years, and I think his book came out, I don't know now, maybe five to ten years ago, um, he was teaching you this vagus breath where you breathe in, for instance, to the count of four, and then you breathe out as long as you can go. So it goes one.

SPEAKER_00 19:15

Yeah, I do it. Um I do it, I do in for four, holds for four, out for six.

SPEAKER_01 19:21

That's fine. So it's a longer outbreath, however you do it, right? And that calms down the vagus nerve so that people with uh post-traumatic stress or panic, anxiety can can calm themselves down. Right. So I started teaching that. You know, you have this nerve, and um it you're responsible for keeping it calm.

SPEAKER_00 19:44

And you can do that. Okay, all right, a couple of circle bikes there. Wow, this is interesting. I keep saying this every week. I love my work. So let's talk about the soul, because I know I've heard before that the soul goes in and out of right. It's it's in front of you sometimes and it goes in, um, and it's around the you said the solar plexus, whether it's your solar plexus is right under your heart here, your solar plexus and it goes around. I've actually never heard um Iphperium DeFort um said that it's a mini U and your body grows around this mini U. So we all we have we're we're matter, right? Made up of energy. So um is this little mini mini me, let's for say that. Um is it energy or mass?

SPEAKER_01 20:39

Well, it's energy, but it it forms a mass of some kind. Um so that what it is is atoms, protons, chemicals. Um, you know, so I'm not sure what it looks like coming up that nerve, but some people have explained it in the 1700, 1800s where they write about they actually saw it outside of you know their body, that it is this egg-shaped, and um it's connected by the um silver cord, is connected by a cord because it always needs the oxygen from your physical body in order to survive. Now, so so okay, so when um when the people that have um had this experience where they can leave from the physical into the etheric or spiritual body. So it's either called etheric, astral, or spiritual. And that would be nice when we all get together uh some from different disciplines, we need to have one dictionary that explains one thing, right? Because we've got like eight different names, and that's why it's so confusing. So um, so when you talk about the soul can be right out in front of you, yes. So when you sleep at night, supposedly, uh this etheric body can come out the top of your head. And can be can can be laying if you're laying straight on the bed, then it's laying straight over you.

SPEAKER_00 22:06

Okay?

SPEAKER_01 22:08

Uh and some some different men that have written books about their leaving their body a lot, they didn't necessarily have spiritual experiences, they just left their body, came back in, wanted people to know you could do this. Uh they say, you know, you can leave your body and then your it goes out, and then you could actually your um etheric body could stand in front of you. Now I know that in they talk about in trauma or an auto accident, your soul, body, or etheric body can just come straight out. But that that's in trauma, right? And then um they say when that happens, your your your etheric body, your soul is very confused because it just got jarred out, you can imagine, right? But the typical way, um, when uh what I've read is that if you die in your bed at night, right, and the ambulance people come for you, and if they're clairvoyant, they can see your body just leaving, go off the top of your head. Excuse me, and then turns into this beautiful light. Sometimes they see an angel coming that will take you. Sometimes they see your deceased relatives come over. It's usually from the right-hand corner, I don't know why. And they're uh giving you a hand so that you can be lifted.

SPEAKER_00 23:23

That is so beautiful. Okay, so the first time I heard that was from Dr. Duane Blair. Uh I don't know if he was Claireborne or what, but he talked about an experience where he was on a beach in Hawaii and this woman drowned, and he was able to see her hovering above her body. So I do know that if you die, then you're and then I heard several places that the soul sticks around for maybe three days or something and it's looking on and all that. I've never heard about the cord though. This is new information to me. Um, and the reason I know about the soul moving in and out, because someone on the show said that the soul is in front of you and moves in and out. And I also know that you're right. Astral travel, um, where the mystics can actually leave their body and come back out. And I do a spiritual warfare prayer that says that you are blocking, because people can, you know, do things to you, you know, if you're if you're an evil person, somebody can send somebody or whatever. So I do a spiritual warfare prayer that you're blocking astral travel. So I I know all these different things, you know, you know, um, not I know them theoretically. I I've never experienced them or feel them or anything like that. So um, so that's beautiful. So you you're saying that the people that have seen the soul say that it's like an extra. Okay, one other thing that I want to I want to comment on. Everybody that talks about the other side, whether it's a near net experience or you having this breath experience, talks about beauty and love. I mean, I I I've never heard of it through breath work, but I've heard everybody talking about near that experiences where they're, you know, they're seeing the light and it's so beautiful and it's so love. So, yeah, talk about your rebirth experience. You know, expand your consciousness about why it's love and beauty and all that.

SPEAKER_01 25:35

Well, I think it's easier when we try to understand that we have three metac metaphysical systems that swirl around us at all times. And um, the first one is the sensory reality where you and I are speaking now, and there's just this, what's happening, and there's past, present, and future. Okay? That's sensory reality, that's normal reality we have. Now, the second reality is the clairvoyant reality. So that is um, well, your soul, wait, anybody that can see your soul body outside of you is clairvoyant. So they have they're usually mediums or psychics who have this gift, okay? And sometimes they have gift, these gifts, but they don't consider them gifts because how come they're seeing all this stuff? And uh when they talked about it when they were little, their parents made them stop or even slap them or punish them because they were seeing it. So um, so it takes them years to figure out that this is a gift of some kind, and that would help them. So in the clairvoyant reality, there is only now. So when people have a near death and they go up there, and maybe and about 20% of them have the spiritual part where they see the flowers and the beautiful music and smell the perfume and everything's wonderful. Um so that is um, and they they usually um meet um a deceased person, a loved one, who tells them it's not your time and you have to come back. And then when they come back, they they have a lot of pain and depression about that. Carl Jung had a vision in the 1940s, and uh, he called it a vision because there wasn't the term near death then, right? So he had he was in the hospital, he had a heart attack, and he left his body and he went out into the universe, and he saw Earth. So when he describes these pictures of Earth, the descriptions fit what the guys who were in space when they took pictures of Earth. Exactly the same thing. Uh, but he had that kind of spiritual experience. So everybody has maybe a little different version. Um, I mean, some people have the classic near death, and you have like 11 characteristics that um you know they can have. Um, other people, you know, have just different um aspects, okay? And I've what I've learned with the research is I believe, number one, that the Holy Spirit is in charge of spiritual experiences and that your soul determines what kind of spiritual sp experience you're gonna have. But when you have it, excuse me, you go into this clairvoyant space where everything is calm and beautiful and loving. So you're touching some part of that fourth dimension, right? And usually the problem is only one person at a time has this. So I'm telling you, and it sounds crazy, so you know, maybe you'll believe me, maybe you won't, you know. So some of the people that have the near-death, um, they have a very high divorce rate after they come back and they start talking about this near-death experience.

SPEAKER_00 28:59

In this day and age, there's so many of them. I I think, yeah, they're they're all over the internet. It's yeah, it's what happens.

SPEAKER_01 29:08

Right. I think that's wonderful, but there must be a part of our um population that still doesn't believe. And a lot of those near-death people, 79% of them were divorced after it happened. Wow. Because they can't talk about it, they're stopped, you know? And um and they want a different job. They want a job where their relationships are better, maybe they make less money, but they don't care. You don't care. Well, they're but their wife or husband cares. Right.

SPEAKER_00 29:35

This is weird, right? That's beautiful. No, but I love yours because you didn't have to die and have a heart attack, and somebody didn't send you back. You just went to a conference and uh you felt something breathing you. Um some kind of I'm assuming it was some spirit form. Um, you know, I'm in the for some reason I'm uh I'm I'm attracting, and there must be a reason, I'm attracting a lot of guests that are talking about spirituality, they're talking about kundalini energy, that are talking, and it's it's you know, my my listeners are gonna have like a two-month spread of these kind of conversations. So um why do you think that um uh that you the you were the one person out of the 21 that was able to feel this breath while nobody else did? What do you think there's a okay, there's a uh what do you think led that up to this? Do you know?

SPEAKER_01 30:45

Is there well I would think it's because um my guardian angel, my spirit spirit guides, and you know, who were supposed to be taking care of my we all have guardian angels and spirit guides, and I understand spirit guides are given to you for life, so they they chose you. So I don't know why they do that. I'd like to talk to them, but anyway, um so it was to change my viewpoint of spirituality that there is a higher power, there is a higher intelligence, that really and have the faith that I am going to be taken care of, that there is a plan for me, which which I now believe. So I have more trust in the universe, I have more trust in the world, and and then I can be more loving and um you know more caring about people who don't believe and you know try to teach them if they're interested. Uh and that's really what I want to do with this book. And I would love to have a um a university class or some kind of educational program that I could start where therapists, because therapists, some of them love it, and then some of them are, well, it's not science. Well, we need a clairvoyant science because we this is not gonna happen in a laboratory that you're gonna wake up and see your deceased mother in front of you. It it isn't you these happen, it's energy, it's love that connects you to them, or to even just having a near death. And so you're gonna have to do it somewhere quiet. And and I think what's important too is lowering your mental capability. Um because when they said um don't think, just breathe.

SPEAKER_00 32:32

Yeah, don't think right, right.

SPEAKER_01 32:34

I use that in life now, right? So, how many hours have I been thinking? So when I go home, excuse me, I'm just I want to garden, I want to take the dog out in the yard, um, I want to maybe you know read a calm book. I mean, I just want to give my spiritual side a rest from this brain.

SPEAKER_00 32:55

Right. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01 32:56

So if you're gonna have a spiritual experience, you're going to have to learn how to meditate, you're gonna have to do some things that um that lower your mental level. I just had that happen yesterday, and I was just amazed. I was in a trance yesterday. Um, it wasn't the normal day, there was nobody in the office, and um the time has just changed, you know, in the last week or two. I don't know how much it's been. And I have this big chime clock on the wall, which it's a big job getting that off and changing it back, right? So it hasn't been changed. And um a friend of I have two friends that come and they walk the dog on Monday. Well, they didn't come, just one came, and um, she said, Oh, I gotta run. So she walked the dog and she left. And I had been starting to type notes. Now I type over 100 words a minute. So I'm typing this little book of like 230 pages. I'm typing all the things I underlined. And this is how I do my research. So I'm sitting here for two solid hours, nobody bothered me, nobody came into this building, and I'm typing, typing, typing, typing. And I am really concentrating on those words that I'm getting, which actually was about the Vegas nerve and clairvoyance. Uh, and I'm so interested because I love to learn that I got up and I went upstairs and used a ladies and came back down, and my four o'clock clients are here. Well, what happened to my three o'clock phone call? Right and hear it.

unknown 34:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:30

Well, and I was, I honest to God, I was in this trance. I was gonna believe that, but I was out of it. Just because now my brain, you would think my brain was thinking a lot, but no, I was really absorbing the letters on the page and just getting them down. And it's it's so technical easy for me to type. Um, I typed nine pages of notes. Well, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:53

And those two hours on autopilot because it's because you know what to do, so that that's amazing. Yeah, all right. So you're in a trance and you love your work and you love to learn. Same here. I love to learn, which is why I love you know talking to luminaries like you. So that's amazing. All right. Now I still didn't get the I know what the vagus nerve does. It keeps us calm, it keeps us disease-free, you know, it regulates a whole bunch of things in our physical world. So, what is the connection to the spiritual word? That is not where the cord comes through, is it? This cord that you're talking about. That would make sense.

SPEAKER_01 35:33

The cord, the cord is attached to your breastbone somewhere, right? Okay. So, okay, so down here, this is the cover of my book, um, what is it called? Psychology of the Soul and the Paranormal. So, okay, so um people have a near death just like I did, it just happened to them, right? So when it happens, what I understand happens is this vagus nerve becomes bigger because it vibrates. Okay, so when things vibrate, it causes structure, right? So that and then something happens around their ears, they say, and their whole body shifts, turns. So I don't know if it turns counterclockwise, I haven't gotten that yet. But then what happens is that this etheric body just gets pushed up the vagus nerve and out the top of the head. Now, I have that written down here so I can read it to you, because I don't have this memorized yet. And I now I've gotten, because of my notes yesterday, a lot more to add to it. So how the soul leaves the physical body around the ears, a whirring noise is heard, and this sends out an impulse to change rotation of the body, and the vibration is now getting stronger in that nerve, and this activates the sacrum through the vagus in the middle of our sympathetic and parasympathetic sections of the nervous system as chemicals are being released. The energy pierces, goes up, pierces the top, the center of your skull, where the medulla oblongata and the pineal gland open the top chakra, which is where your soft spot used to be. And people usually hear a click in the head area, which results in one's leaving one's body, expanding their consciousness with an outer body or a near death. And this bodily energy would be like the energy that powers the orgasmic response. So your physical body becomes shaken down to a molecular level, an atomic level, activating the spiritual body to leave the physical, going up the vagus nerve, silver cord, which is attached at the breastbone, because you need that to attach when you leave so that you get oxygen while you're up there flying around. Okay. And this this mag this magnetic operation depends entirely on the pure effort of the soul using the spirit etheric body uh through the highway of the vagus nerve.

SPEAKER_00 38:17

Yeah, it's a good word for it. Highway, right? Isn't it? Okay. That's great. Well, that was really what I was really curious about. So that's basically. So um when does I mean it's pretty technical, but I'm curious. So when does this happen? Not let's talk about near debt. We're talking about actual debt. Um uh is it true that I heard that the still sticks around for about three days or so before it goes, or according to year research, it goes immediately flying around.

SPEAKER_01 38:49

Well, there's there's all kinds of stories about that. Okay, three days once the soul leaves, to have a um, they have to have a life review. So the soul actually goes through a life review where they get a movie of their life from the time they were born until they've just died. Wow. And that is given to them from the perspective of the other people. So it's how you treated all these people all of your life. Wow. Which I should think is Are you guys listening?

SPEAKER_00 39:21

There is an accountability in Christianity, it's supposed to be the day of reckoning, like, but it's apparently happens according to according to Reverend Dr. Karen, it happens as soon as you die. Anyway, good.

SPEAKER_01 39:37

Well, within the three days somehow. So I don't I don't know exactly how that happens, but um so they um they get this life review, um, and then they say a lot of people that say that they've been at their funeral, which is usually more than three days, that well, they come back, the etheric body comes back because they're still like pretty low, they're a little bit above us. And um, they say they can understand all everybody's thoughts at that funeral, which has got to be pretty eye-opening. Nothing you can do about it now, you're dead. No, and then they leave. But um, so it's all very interesting that process. Um and uh, you know, it's just it's something that we need to we need more clairvoyant researchers, which I keep saying over and over, please. But you see, people are afraid of of psychics and mediums, right? So we have to lower that fear that psychics and mediums are just like you and I. They they uh there's an Arthur Finley college in England where they go to learn and they have courses that they take just like you know, therapists do, or whatever you have to learn about what you do in the world. I think I think it's beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 40:53

I don't see anything wrong with it. I've had several mediums on the show. Are you a medium?

SPEAKER_01 40:57

Because I heard I have I have very good intuition just from being a therapist, but uh I am not a medium. And I am talking to a medium right now, and we're trying to write a book about the medium and the therapist because I I have all this research where I can say, well, they proved this, they proved this, they proved this, right? Right, and then the medium does all kinds of things. And she tells me, Karen, you just have to pay attention to your guides. I said, Well, yeah, but you know, they don't speak English, these people. And so, you know, you know, I have uh my oldest daughter is on the other side. So she has come through, she she died at at 50, and um she has come through to Debbie and the Medium, and she talked about her life review and what that was like, and she said she was very carefully watched that, and um and that she was surprised at how she treated people. So now, so this leads to another thing about spirituality. Why do spirits come in when you go to a medium visit? Right? Why do your loved ones come in?

SPEAKER_00 42:06

Well, sometimes I know the answer to that because spirits, um, I understand that they have to lower we we're we're we're different vibrations, and you mentioned it, right? So we they have to either lower theirs or we have to increase ours. So I think this the mediums are able to increase theirs, and I think that's how they connect. Am I right?

SPEAKER_01 42:32

Yes, however, why did my daughter want to come back and and talk to me, right? Well, for one reason, she wanted to ask forgiveness.

unknown 42:42

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 42:44

So I didn't know that when she came back, and I wouldn't have said that until I'd say I think it was last year when she came back. So you have to have time to think about all this too, you know, and kind of put it in slots. But, you know, I remember reading a paper once that said, Well, meeting uh spirits want to come back to tell you something. So lots of times they tell you don't sell the house till you find the money in the attic, you know. Or whatever life insurance policy is or something, right? Yes, where is the black box, right? And um, so she wanted to come back to tell me that I now know what I did was wrong, you know, some of the stuff, and that my attitude, you know, was you know really not the best. And um, so we talked about that, and Debbie wasn't didn't know about life review till then. And I said, and and Debbie said, she's seeing all these things. And I said, well, ask her if it's her life review. And she said, Yes, it was. So pretty much everybody has a life review, and only you judge it. Angels, spiritual guys, whoever's watching with you, there's no judgment up there about what you did. It's just, you know, if you feel guilty about it.

unknown 43:55

All right.

SPEAKER_00 43:56

Wow. You're I'm learning, I'm learning some new stuff. From you, Karen. I'm loving it. That's amazing. All right. So we we talked about the vagus nerve. We're going to spend a lot of time here. So we talked about the vagus nerve and we talked about the spirituality and how the soul leaves the body through the vagus nerve highway. But you also talk about the vagus nerve and the spinal cord. Give us that connection. I'm pretty sure that is not spirituality. That is just physical, right?

SPEAKER_01 44:30

Physically, it's it comes right down the spinal part. Yes. That's all I know about it. That it that's there. Okay, that's it. And then right around your chakras are in the same place that are invisible. And so the chakras would be giving the vibration to the vagus nerve. Okay. Because they are circles of energy, you know. And so if you go to a healer, usually when they they do that or Reiki, they put their hands over you, they are unblocking those chakras because if you have trauma or grief or anger, it blocks those energy centers. Yes. And so then that's why you feel better when you leave after one of those healings.

SPEAKER_00 45:07

Yeah. Well, I've never been to Reiki, but I do a lot of meditation work and I do a lot of um energy work and you know, my thoughts and you know, all that type of stuff. And um I'm learning to connect with my spirit guide. Um I listen for intuition and um and now I'm starting to analyze my dreams because I understand that your dreams are your subconscious and your and your um and your spirit guide. So I'm starting to have a dream journal and I write it down and all that stuff. So so that's amazing. All right. So um good job as far as your research goes, and and this is an amazing topic. And the fact that you want to now, you know, you now have a purpose um sharing it. There's anything that anyone got out of this, is that there's a life review, and there's a life review um before your spirit, I mean your soul, goes on to the you know, the next thing. Once it's in the plane air, you get a spiritual, you get it, you get your review. So that's amazing. All right. So you've written um several books. Um, one of them is called You're Not Finished Yet, Grandma, What is a Soul? And then the other one is Psychology of the Soul and the Paranormal. So talk to us about your books. Um, what made you write the book after, you know, obviously you want to share this experience. Um, and what do you want people to walk away with after reading? You can talk about one or you can talk about both.

SPEAKER_01 46:40

Okay, well, the first one you're not finished yet, uh, was about um people that grew up in an alcoholic or dysfunctional family, and um and the characteristics you have there and how you get out of that. And the last two chapters are on spirituality, because a lot of people that live with trauma and alcoholism, um, they don't believe there is a God, just like I didn't, uh, because you think it's just too messy down here, and you know, we're not the right kind of people, right? Um so that was my beginning. And then the second one was grandma, what is the soul? And that was my last grandchild uh when he was five. We were in the car and he said, Grandma, I don't like to talk about this very often. Well, we never had talked about it, but I don't want you to die. And I, you know, they sit in that back car seat, you know, until they're 17. And so I thought, well, and he's afraid, you know, he sounded afraid. So, um, so I have a PhD in spiritual psychology. So I thought, well, I ought to be able to handle this one. So I said, um I said, Well, you know, you have to be really old to die. And I'm not really old yet. Uh, but you know, usually that's when you die. But when I get to be really, really old and I die, my soul will come back and I'll watch over you. So he said, Grandma, what is a soul?

SPEAKER_00 47:59

And that's the title of your book.

SPEAKER_01 48:01

Amazing. Yes. So I told it so that's a children's book. And it has a section for parents. So if um and I understand people have used that and that that where the children have grief and they want to know where grandma is or whoever. And um, and it's been, you know, that's been a lot of fun, you know, giving that to people so that they could really help the kids with it with the idea. And um, and then then after I got um after I had my spiritual experience and I had all these weird stories coming, I thought, if we're if we, you know, the people in this room with me, we've had these, other people have had them. Right? So I want to know more about that. And I want to be able to explain to them how this happens. Because then by then I was realizing that people that come in in chronic grief, lots of times, you know, this warm, wonderful therapy you give them does not help that grief, mainly because they have so much guilt. And and you can say, you know, guilt is self-destructive, and you did the best thing you you could at the time and you need to forgive you, but they still have this guilt, right? So um I then I started, I had a you know, a few mediums around here that I had gone to and my friends, and I started just giving out names. If if you want to go and you want to see what Charlie says, just make an appointment. Now, we can't guarantee that Charlie's gonna come in, right? But you've had like s several people had had maybe their spouse died, or then their parents had died a year before, or their favorite aunt or uncle had died. Somebody is going to come in because they want to talk to you. And I really believe that some of us are sent, and and you know, these spiritual guides from everybody are saying, send them to a medium, send them to a medium, because I want to talk to them.

SPEAKER_00 49:54

You want to talk, right, right, right.

SPEAKER_01 49:57

And so then eventually they will go. And men are the most difficult usually to go. And of course, their families say. No, you can't be logical. So uh, but their families say don't do it, it's not a good thing, and their religions say don't do it, it's not a good thing. Um, so so one of the things that I learned in studying was that William James, who's a father of American psychology, he studied mediums. Now, if you go to any college course about William James, you never learn that. Never.

SPEAKER_00 50:30

He took it out of the curriculum.

SPEAKER_01 50:33

Well, they just don't mention it. And and he um so they mentioned the books he wrote about, you know, two first books on psychology, and then his book, um, varieties of religious experience. Oh all that's lovely. But he and his wife lost a toddler child, and so you know, Mrs. James went to find out where was her child. And he and she and she took him, and then they found Lenora Piper, who was his favorite medium, and he and and for 25 years, he and lots of psychological people studied her. So why don't we have that in psychology, in regular psychology, we don't. And then Carl Jung is sitting over there in Switzerland and visiting Freud once in a while in Vienna, and his mother was psychic. And his grandfather used to talk to his first wife at lunch with his second wife. So Carl Jung said, Well, his mother was, yeah, good mother, but every once in a while she'd say something had nothing to do with the conversation. And then he said, You don't go in a room at night because there's lots of voices and noises in there. So he he he watched all this. And so he he's working in a you know, he he his first job out of college was um assistant manager at a mental hospital that was a block long. It was a little village, really. And he stayed there for six months. The staff lived upstairs on the second floor. He never left for six months because he was so intrigued. Like, how does all this happen? Yeah, and and so why don't we teach it in psychology? You know, we should.

SPEAKER_00 52:04

Yeah, yeah. I don't know because again, like someone said to you, it's not science, and everybody wants science, you know what I mean? Uh they wanna they don't want to put anything out there that maybe can't be proven or whatever, but we know it's around, you know, stories everywhere, um, narrated experiences, mediums. Um uh one of the one of my my um uh my most favorite interviews was a mother that um you know lost her son, you know, he committed suicide and she was heartbroken and decided to go to a medium, and and the medium told her that she was a medium, and and um uh she had this relationship with her son um because he came through the medium, talked to her, um, and then he started helping her with other people. So he was working. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 52:59

Yeah, he was a channel, yeah. And and now we uh are you familiar with the Bix um essay contest in Las Vegas?

SPEAKER_00 53:08

No.

SPEAKER_01 53:09

Okay, well, Robert Bigelow is a billionaire and he runs the Bigelow Institute of Consciousness Study, so that's B-I-C-S. And um he in 2020, I think it was, he um sent a letter to the New York Times and he was gonna pay over a million dollars for paranormal researchers to send him a paper 25,000 words or less, um proving in a court of law. So you only had to have proof for in a court of law that there was life after death. So uh twelve hundred people write for the application, and nine months later, two hundred and four people submit a paper of twenty-five word thousand words or less. And then in November he gives a million, uh no, five hundred thousand dollars to the first prize winner who was Jeffrey Mishlove, who uh used to be on PBS and he interviewed all these spiritual and you know physics people um and so every reference in his paper practically was a video because he had talked about it. So that's the and also he had a spiritual experience. So then um the second prize was 300,000, and that was the gentleman in um Holland who writes about near-death experiences, third one uh was 150,000, and the fourth place was actually a gentleman I know who won 50,000. He said, I got a new car out of it. And uh and he wrote about how we have all the proof we need for mediumship coming back from the 1800s to like 1929. That's all you need. You don't need any more proof. Um but um I love this proof in a court of law because it you you would um then be able to compare characteristics of your experience, my experience, and we would get different levels of experiences, which is what we have now from all this research. But they're actually saying it's not gonna happen in a lab.

SPEAKER_00 55:05

Right, right, right, yes, yeah. Yeah, and like what you said earlier, that a lot of times people don't believe it, just like you said that um people that had near deck experience, I think you said a big number, 79% of them, um end in divorce because people don't believe them or whatever. So when you know he put proven in a curta law, I'm thinking of you know, um, you gotta have uh some kind of physical evidence. What did you bring back with you or something? I don't know. That's right. What knowledge?

unknown 55:38

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 55:40

Yeah, well, we don't need physical proof, we just need to know that there's reasonable doubt. That's right. That's in the court of law.

SPEAKER_01 55:50

Well, and it's but it's mysterious, it's a mystery. And I don't think the higher intelligence is ever going to say, well, this happens, this, you know, it's ever going to be like science. But we know we know a lot, you know, what from my what, like I've told you today. We know all of that from different spirits that have come back, talk to mediums, right? Different spirits that have come back talking to this researcher who I can't imagine sat and wrote about this for 30 years, you know, with no computer, and and told about people who saw their soul in their bedroom at night. I mean, it's just amazing.

SPEAKER_00 56:24

Oh, that's beautiful. Well, Karen, this has been a fantastic conversation. It definitely tickled my imagination and tickled my mental capacity and my spiritual um capacity. I'm a little smarter after having talking to you. Um, and I love your analogy of how the soul leaves the body. That's one of the things I'm gonna walk away with in the review. Um, I love that. I love that. So, yes, guys. Um, and I guess the book that you talk about this is the last book, Psychology of the Soul and the Paranormal.

SPEAKER_01 57:02

Yeah, it has some of the illustrations in there and shows your vagus nerve with all the different just seven psychic centers. Actually, those are seven chakras, um, and those are the ones that vibrate, and um, they help mediums get this information because mediums have bigger chakras than you and I. So that means they have more energy.

SPEAKER_00 57:22

Their energy level is a bit stronger. Yeah, okay, that's amazing. All right, guys. So listen, you want to know more about this stuff, and you should, because you know, knowledge is power, and how you can change your life and how you can become more spiritual, because we didn't spend a lot of time on it, but you know, um uh Karen talked about the fact that we're both um physical and spiritual. No, I've always known that because we are our thoughts are spiritual. They can't find our mind anywhere. The mind is not in our body. So I've always known that. You know, she's just had a little, as far as I'm concerned, a little bigger dimension to the whole thing about, you know, this, you know, this this thing that's in you that grows with you. Um, and then you're connected, you know, your soul and getting oxygen and all that. So I would definitely like to learn more. This is basically an hour conversation, but uh like to learn more so we could be better humans while we're here. Better humans when while we're here, so that when we go to that review, then you know we can be proud of the fact that we have you know helped. And uh, you know, um one of the the psychics that was on the show told me that she sees that I have a calling to share this knowledge with you, which is what I'm doing. So hopefully I've got a good review because I'm helping you guys live your best life, right?

SPEAKER_01 58:52

You're gonna love your movie.

SPEAKER_00 58:55

Yeah, because I'm out here sharing and helping others, right? Right. Right, that's amazing. All right, so we know that we can get your books on Amazon. So, how can anybody um get in touch with you if they want to connect? What's your website? What's your meeting?

SPEAKER_01 59:13

If they want to email me, they can email me at Karen, K-A-R-E-N, at Karen, Herrick, H E R R I C K dot com. So that's Karen at Karen Herrick.com. And then they I have a website that you can go on, and there's you know other podcasts and things if you want to watch. Um and that's Karen, K-A-R-E-N-E Herrick.com. And Herrick is H E R R I C K. Are you on social media? Uh yes, I am on social media. And they they can come on there, although I don't watch it as frequently as I should.

SPEAKER_00 59:58

Um What's your handle? Same thing, Karen Herrick? Yes. Okay. All right, guys. Well, listen, Karen has been a fantastic conversation. I loved it. Thank you guys for tuning in to the Transform Your Mind to Transform Your Life. That's basically why I bring you beautiful, enlightened guests every week by Karen. A transcript of my conversation with Karen will be on the show page, which is blog.myhelps.us, and I will link out to her books. I will link that to her website, and you'll also have her email on there if you've missed it. Yeah, if you want to continue um learning about spirituality, the vagus nerve is the most important nerve in your body. Learn about it. Learn how it can keep you calm. Learn how it can help you um uh with your um, you know, fight or flight syndrome. Um I we we talk briefly about the breath, but I do a box breath. Well, it's not really a box breath, but it's um 446. Or, you know, I heard Tony Robbins talk the other day about 8, 10, 32 or something. Haven't been able to hold my breath for 32 yet. But I mean, there is there's there's ways that you can do it just so that you can activate your um your vagus nerve. So yes, um definitely um uh go and pick up Karen's book, which is you know, even the one for your kid, what is a soul? Um yes, you know, um a lot of kids are that that was not unique. A lot of kids, you know, worry about their grandma passing, or children worry about their parents passing. Yeah. And um it's it's actually very good to to let them know that there's a soul and and that the you know you really never die, that your spirit is always around. That's basically, you know, the Christianity belief. Um, so yeah, so uh I hope that you learned as much as I did on this episode. Um, continue your learning by picking up a copy of our book. Um if you're listening to this show on iTunes, we'd love for you to give it a reading and a review. If you're watching on YouTube, we'd love for you to subscribe. I guarantee you that I bring you good content every week like this one. Um, any last words, Kara, before we wrap up?

SPEAKER_01 1:02:30

I just am so glad. Thank you. I love your work and keep doing that. And um, for everybody listening, Half a Life is showing up. You're not gonna have anything happen to you if you sit in your living room. So half a life is showing up, and then have faith because chance rules.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:47

I love that. Yes, I love that. That's uh that's a nice tweetable um uh you know, um quote. Right. All right, guys. Right. Well, we're fresh out of time. Thanks, Karen. Thanks for watching. Transform your mind. Um hope to see you um next week, same time. Until then, namaste.