I used to have a dream journal, which I misplaced in a piece of luggage unused for over a decade. I would “wake up” without really being awake, and write some of the damnedest stuff, sometimes. Then, I would not even remember ever writing it. This is one of many that I never recalled writing. I found this one while on vacation in Japan in 2019
In April of 1987, after I had been sober for about one month after 16 years of hell, I had a series of three dreams, on three consecutive nights.
In the first dream, I was an early teenager, hanging out with 4 or 5 other boys, who were my buddies. My name, in the dream, was Bobby Clements.
In the second dream, we are all enlisting, as a group, to enter WWII. We told the recruiter that we all wanted to fly on the same plane, or we would not accept service. We were promised that the Air Force would do everything in their power to make sure that we all were on duty in the same location, and, perhaps, share space on the same military aircraft
In the third dream, I am piloting an aircraft, with all of my buddies assuming support roles. We are flying into anti-aircraft shelling turbulence, and I can no longer keep the aircraft under control. My buddies stay in their positions, but apparently whatever hit us from below, is a fatal blow. I know that we are all going to die. The dream ends.
I researched Bobby Clements substantially for two months (prior to advent of the internet) later in 1987. I drove to Philomath, Oregon with my wife Sharon, researching the Clements family there, but came up short.
Several decades later, my sister took up the search for me. My sister is a STRONG BELIEVER in reincarnation, and she has memories from her own past life experiences.
In her research, she came up with Robert “Bobby” Kelly Clements, of Nova Scotia, Canada.. Robert flew a Lancaster bomber for the RAF out of England, and he was allowed to hand pick his crew, according to the records. He picked his five Nova Scotia friends!
His story was identical to what I saw in the three dream sequence, according to the family reports that she had read about “Bobby”, too.
Umm, Bobby was an electrician prior to his enlistment. As an eight year old, I wanted to become an electrician more than anything, save becoming an Air Force pilot. I had a full ride scholarship to the Air Force, was in the ROTC at the U of Portland, then dropped out due to my first wife’s severe health issues.
I eventually retired, as an electrician, in 2016,.
I tried to commit suicide in 1986, when I finally realized that my childhood dreams of being, first an Air Force pilot, and then an astronaut, were never, ever to be realized in this incarnation.
Eerie!
Here is my letter to my sister, acknowledging the experience:
PENTAX Image
Revisiting the Mysteries of Consciousness: A Case for the Interconnectedness of Lives
The Division of Perceptual Studies within the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Virginia School of Medicine has amassed a formidable collection of case studies that might just be the Rosetta Stone for understanding human consciousness and its complexities. These case studies focus on children who seem to recall moments, events, and intimate details of lives that are not their own, seemingly pointing a finger at the possibility of reincarnation, or at the very least, challenging our conventional frameworks of understanding identity and experience.
At the heart of the debate is the compelling evidence these case studies provide—evidence that nudges the scientific community to reconsider rigid perspectives on the boundaries of individual experience and the linear progression of life and death. What becomes of our understanding of the self if indeed these children are sharing an identity with someone long passed into the annals of history? This phenomenon dares to suggest that consciousness may not be as individualized and isolated as previously thought.
The concept of reincarnation, once relegated to the realm of religious belief and philosophical speculation, receives a breath of empirical life through these cases. The remarkable detail with which some of these children recount their ‘past lives’ stands as a testament to the need for a broader interpretative lens when examining human experience beyond birth and death. Rather than outrightly endorsing reincarnation, these instances invite a studious inquiry into the possibility of shared identities—portals into past lives, carried within the thread of cumulative human consciousness.
The alternative explanations of psychometry and telepathy open additional pathways to understanding these phenomena. The possibility that individuals might access memories, emotions, and experiences of others—living or deceased—through objects or dreams suggests a level of interconnectedness and collective consciousness that transcends current scientific explanation. My personal experiences with dreams, where I’ve accessed others’ lives and memories, underscore the multifaceted nature of consciousness and hint at a profound, shared human repository of experience.
The reluctance to bridge the gap between the empirical and the experiential often stymies progress in understanding phenomena that don’t fit neatly into established scientific paradigms. The evidence calls for an open-minded approach, one that dares to question, explore, and, ultimately, expand the scientific narrative to include the extraordinary and the unexplained.
The investigation into these phenomena should not be quickly dismissed as pseudoscience but encouraged as part of the broader endeavor to elucidate the mysteries of the human mind and consciousness. By acknowledging the possibility of reincarnation, psychometry, and telepathy, and by rigorously studying these phenomena, we inch closer to grasping the full spectrum of human experience—perhaps even the essence of consciousness itself.
In a world where the known and the unknown dance around the edges of scientific understanding, the work of the Division of Perceptual Studies serves as a beacon. It guides us toward a future where the exploration of consciousness and the potential interconnectedness of our lives are not just acknowledged but celebrated as crucial to unraveling what it means to be human.
