4. The Displaced Soul
THERE are souls who have been so severely damaged they are detached from the mainstream of souls going back to a spiritual home base. Compared to all returning entities, the number of these abnormal souls is not large. However, what has happened to them on Earth is significant because of the serious effect they have on other incarnated souls.
There are two types of displaced souls: those who do not accept the fact their physical body is dead and fight returning to the spirit world for reasons of personal anguish, and those souls who have been subverted by, or had complicity with, criminal abnormalities in a human body. In the first instance, displacement is of the soul’s own choosing, while in the second case, spiritual guides deliberately remove these souls from further association with other entities for an indeterminate period. In both situations, the guides of these souls are intimately concerned with rehabilitation, but because the circumstances are quite different between each type of displaced soul, I will treat them separately.
The first type we call ghosts. These spirits refuse to go home after physical death and often have unpleasant influences on those of us who would like to finish out our own human lives in peace. These displaced souls are sometimes falsely called “demonic spirits” because they are accused of invading the minds of people with harmful intent. The subject of negative Spirits has produced serious investigations in the field of parapsychology. Unfortunately, this area of spirituality has also attracted a fringe element of the unscrupulous associated with the occult, who prey on the emotions of susceptible people
The troubled spirit is an immature entity with unfinished business in a past life on Earth. They may have no relation to the living person who is disrupted by them. It is true that some people are convenient and receptive conduits for negative spirits who wish to express their querulous nature. This means that someone who is in a deep meditative state of consciousness might occasionally pick up annoying signal patterns from a discarnated being whose communications can range from the frivolous to provocative. These unsettled entities are not spiritual guides. Real guides are healers and don’t intrude with acrimonious messages.
More often than not, these uncommon haunted spirits are tied to a particular geographic location. Researchers who have specialized in the phenomena of ghosts indicate those disturbed entities are caught in a no-man’s land between the lower astral planes of Earth and the spirit world. From my own research, I don’t believe these souls are lost in space, nor are they demonic. They choose to remain within the Earth plane after physical death for a time by their own volition due to a high level of discontent. In my opinion, they are damaged souls because they evidence confusion, despair, and even hostility to such an extent they want their guides to stay away from them. We do know a negative, displaced entity can be reached and handled by various means, such as exorcism, to get them to stop interfering with human beings. Possessing spirits can be persuaded to leave and eventually make a proper transition into the spirit world.
If we have a spirit world governed by order, with guides who care about us, how can maladaptive souls who exert negative energy upon incarnated beings be allowed to exist? One explanation is that we still have free will, even in death. Another is that since we endure so many upheavals in our physical universe, then spiritual irregularities and deviations from the normal exodus of souls ought to be anticipated as well. Discarnate, unhappy spirits who trap themselves are possibly part of a grand design. When they are ready, these souls will be taken by the hand away from Earth’s astral plane and guided to their proper place in the spirit world. I turn now to the far more prevalent second type of disturbed soul. These are souls who have been involved with evil acts. We should first speculate if a soul can be considered culpable or guilt-free when it occupied the offending criminal brain? Is the soul mind or human ego responsible, or are they the same? Occasionally, a client will say to me, “I feel possessed by an inner force which tells me to do bad things.” There are mentally ill people who feel driven by opposing forces of good and evil over which they believe they have no control.
After working for years with the superconscious minds of people under hypnosis, I have come to the conclusion that the five-sensory human can negatively act upon a soul’s psyche. We express our eternal self through dominant biological needs and the pressures of environmental stimuli which are temporary to the incarnated soul. Although there is no hidden, sinister self within our human form, some souls are not fully assimilated. People not in harmony with their bodies feel detached from themselves in life.
This condition does not excuse souls from doing their utmost to prevent evil involvement on Earth. We see this in human conscience. It is important we distinguish between what is exerting a negative force on our mind and what is not. Hearing an inner voice which may suggest self-destruction to ourselves or someone else is not a demonic spiritual entity, an alien presence, nor a malevolent renegade guide. Negative forces emanate from ourself.
The destructive impulses of emotional disorders, if left untreated, inhibit soul development. Those of us who have experienced unresolved personal trauma in our lives carry the seeds of our own destruction. This anguish affects our soul in such a way that it seems we are not whole. For instance, excessive craving and addictive behavior, which is the outgrowth of personal pain, inhibits the expression of a healthy soul and may even hold a soul in bondage to its host body.
Does the extent of contemporary violence mean that we have more souls “going wrong” today than in the past? If nothing else, our over-population and mind- altering drug culture should support this conclusion. On the positive side, Earth’s international level of consciousness toward human suffering appears to be rising.
I’ve been told that in every era of Earth’s bloody history there has always been a significant number of souls unable to resist and successfully counter human cruelty. Certain souls, whose hosts have a genetic disposition to abnormal brain chemistry, are particularly at risk in a violent environment. We see how children can be so damaged by physical and emotional family abuse that, as adults, they commit premeditated acts of atrocity without feelings of remorse. Since souls are not created perfect, their nature can be contaminated during the development of such a life form.
If our transgressions are especially serious we call them evil. My subjects say to me no soul is inherently evil, although it may acquire this label in human life. Pathological evil in humans is characterized by feelings of personal impotence and weakness which is stimulated by helpless victims.
Although souls who are involved with truly evil acts should generally be considered at a low level of development, soul immaturity does not automatically invite malevolent behavior from a damaged human personality. The evolution of souls involves a transition from imperfection to perfection based upon overcoming many difficult body assignments during their task-oriented lives. Souls may also have a predisposition for selecting environments where they consistently don’t work well, or are subverted. Thus, souls may have their identity damaged by poor life choices. However, all souls are held accountable for their conduct in the bodies they occupy. We will see in the next chapter how souls receive an initial review of their past life with guides before moving on to join their friends. But what happens to souls who have, through their bodies, caused extreme suffering to another? If a soul is not capable of ameliorating the most violent human urges in its host body, how is it held accountable in afterlife? This brings up the issue of being sent to heaven or hell for good and bad deeds because accountability has long been a part of our religious traditions.
On the wall of my office hangs an Egyptian painting, “The Judgment Scene,” as represented in the Book of the Dead, which is a mythological ritual of death over 7,000 years old. The ancient Egyptians had an obsession with death and the world beyond the grave because, in their cosmic pantheon, death explained life. The picture shows a newly deceased man arriving in a place located between the land of the living and the kingdom of the dead. He stands by a set of scales about to be judged for his past deeds on Earth. The master of ceremonies is the god Anubis, who carefully weighs the man’s heart on one pan of the scale against the ostrich feather of truth on the opposite side. The heart, not the head, represented the embodiment of a person’s soul-conscience to the Egyptians. It is a tense moment. A crocodile-headed monster is crouched nearby with his mouth open, ready to devour the heart if the man’s wrongs outweigh the good he did in life. Failure at the scales would end the existence of this soul.
I get quite a few comments from my clients about this picture. A metaphysically oriented person would insist no one is denied entrance into the kingdom of afterlife, regardless of how unfavorably balanced the scales might be toward past conduct. Is this belief true? Are all souls given the opportunity to transmute back into the spirit world the same way, irrespective of their association with the bodies they occupied? To answer this question, I should begin by mentioning that a large segment of society believes all souls do not go to the same place. More moderate theology no longer stresses the idea of hellfire and brimstone for sinners. However, many religious sects indicate a spiritual coexistence of two mental states of good and evil.
For the “bad” soul there are ancient philosophical pronouncements denoting a separation from the God-Essence as a means of punishment after death.
The Tibetan Book of the Dead, a source of religious belief thousands of years older than the Bible, describes the state of consciousness between lives (the Bardo) as a time when “the evil we have perpetrated projects us into spiritual separation.” If the peoples of the East believed in a special spiritual location for evil doers, was this idea similar to the concept of purgatory in the Western world?
From its earliest beginnings, Christian doctrine defined purgatory as a transitory state of temporary banishment for sins of a minor nature against humanity. The Christian purgatory is supposed to be a place of atonement, isolation, and suffering. When all negative karma is removed, these souls are eventually allowed into heaven. On the other hand, souls committing major (deadly) sins are condemned to hell forever.
Does hell exist to permanently separate good souls from bad ones? All my case work with the spirits of my subjects has convinced me there is no residence of terrible suffering for souls, except on Earth. I am told all souls go to one spirit world after death where everyone is treated with patience and love.
However, I have learned that certain souls do undergo separation in the spirit world, and this happens at the time of their orientation with guides. They are not activated along the same travel routes as other souls. Those of my subjects who have been impeded by evil report that souls whose influence was too weak to turn aside a human impulse to harm others will go into seclusion upon reentering the spirit world. These souls don’t appear to mix with other entities in the conventional manner for quite a while.
I have also noticed that those beginner souls who are habitually associated with intensely negative human conduct in their first series of lives must endure individual spiritual isolation. Ultimately, they are placed together in their own group to intensify learning under close supervision. This is not punishment, but rather a kind of purgatory for the restructuring of self-awareness with these souls.
Because wrongdoing takes so many forms on Earth, spiritual instruction and the type of isolation used is varied for each soul. The nature of these variations apparently is evaluated during orientation at the end of each life. Relative time of seclusion and reindoctrination is not consistent either. For instance, I have had reports about maladjusted spirits who have returned back to Earth directly after a period of seclusion in order to expunge themselves as soon as possible by a good incarnated performance, Here is an example, as told to me by a soul who was acquainted with one of these spirits.
Case 10
Dr. N: Do souls bear responsibility for their involvement with flawed human beings who injure others in life?
S: Yes, those who have wronged others savagely in a life-I knew one of those souls.
Dr. N: What do you know about this entity? What happened after this soul returned to the spirit world following that life?
S: He … had hurt a girl … terribly … and did not rejoin our group. There was extensive private study for him because he did so poorly while in that body.
Dr. N: What was the extent of his punishment?
S: Punishment is … a wrong interpretation … it’s regeneration. You have to recognize this is a matter for your teacher. The teachers are more strict with those who have been involved with cruelty.
Dr. N: What does “more strict” mean to you in the spirit world?
S: Well, my friend didn’t go back with us … his friends … after this sad life where he hurt this girl.
Dr. N: Did he come through the same spiritual gateway as yourself when he died?
S: Yes, but he did not meet with anybody … he went directly to a place where he was alone with the teacher.
Dr. N: And then what happened to him?
S: After awhile … not long … he returned to Earth again as a woman … where people were cruel … physically abusive … it was a deliberate choice … my friend needed to experience that …
Dr. N: Do you think this soul blamed the human brain of his former host body for hurting the girl?
S: No, he took what he had done … back into himself … he blamed his own lack of skill to overcome the human failings. He asked to become an abused woman himself in the next life to gain understanding… to appreciate the damage he had done to the girl.
Dr. N: If this friend of yours did not gain understanding and continued involving himself with humans who committed wrongful acts, could he be destroyed as a soul by someone in the spirit world?
S: (long pause) You can’t destroy energy exactly … but it can be reworked… negativity which is unmanageable … in many lives … can be readjusted.
Dr. N: How?
S: (vaguely) … Not by destruction … remodeling …
Case 10 did not respond further to this line of questioning, and other subjects who know something about these damaged souls are rather sparse with their information. Later, we will learn a bit more about the formation and restoration of intelligent energy.
Most errant souls are able to solve their own problems of contamination. The price we pay for our misdeeds and the rewards received for good conduct revolve around the laws of karma. Perpetrators of harm to others will do penance by setting themselves up as future victims in a karmic cycle of justice. The Bhagavad Gita, another early Eastern scripture which has stood the test of thousands of years, has a passage which says, “souls of evil influence must redeem their virtue.”
No study of life after death would have any meaning without addressing how karma relates to causality and justice for all souls. Karma by itself does not denote good or bad deeds. Rather it is the result of one’s positive and negative actions in life. The statement, “there are no accidents in our lives,” does not mean karma by itself impels. What it does is propel us forward by teaching lessons. Our future destiny is influenced by a past from which we cannot escape, especially when we injure others. The key to growth is understanding we are given the ability to make mid-course corrections in our life and having the courage to make necessary changes when what we are doing is not working for us. By conquering fear and taking risks, our karmic pattern adjusts to the effects of new choices. At the end of every life, rather than having a monster waiting to devour our souls, we serve as our most severe critic in front of teacher-guides. This is why karma is both just and merciful. With the help of our spiritual counselors and peers we decide on the proper mode of justice for our conduct.
Some people who believe in reincarnation also think if negative souls do not learn their lessons within a reasonable span of lives, they will be eliminated and replaced by more willing souls. My subjects deny this premise.
There is no set path of self-discovery designed for all souls. As one subject told me, “souls are assigned to Earth for the duration of the war.” This means souls are given the time and opportunity to make changes for growth. Souls who continue to display negative attitudes through their human hosts must overcome these difficulties by continually making an effort to change. From what I have seen, no negative karma remains attached to a soul who is willing to work during their many lives on this planet.
It is an open question whether a soul should be held entirely at fault for humanity’s irrational, unsocialized, and destructive acts. Souls must learn to cope in different ways with each new human being assigned to them. The permanent identity of a soul stamps the human mind with a distinctive character which is individual to that soul. However, I find there is a strange dual nature between the soul mind and human brain. I will discuss this concept further in later chapters, after the reader learns more about the existence of souls in the spirit world.
