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Authors: Colin Stanley
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will publicly admit the existence of spirits….Before that trip to Pontefract I had been in basic agreement with them [but that] case left me in no possible doubt that the entity …was a spirit….And I must admit that it still causes me a kind of flash of protest to write such a sentence: the rationalist in me wants to say, ‘Oh come off it….’Yet the evidence points clearly in that direction and it would be simple dishonesty not to admit it …the picture that now began to emerge made me aware of how far my preconceptions had caused me to impose an unnatural logic on the whole subject of the paranormal.It was not so much that the conceptions underlying The Occult and Mysteries were wrong as that they were incomplete….”(238)
[It has not been possible, in an essay of this length, to present the details of this case.Readers who are interested should refer to the above mentioned book and decide for themselves whether Wilson’s ‘conversion’ was justified.]
This implies, of course, that there is life after death and Wilson went on to write Afterlife: an investigation of the evidence for life after death in 1985 (London: Harrap Ltd.) in which he concluded that evidence points unmistakably to survival.
In the light of these revelations, Wilson uses the next three chapters to take a ‘new’ look at witchcraft, magic, possession, multiple personality, astral projection and spiritualism, asking finally:
“…how far does it matter whether there is a ‘psychic world’, whether spirits exist, whether reincarnation is a reality, whether mediums really contact the dead?….What is interesting about the paranormal is its suggestion that we possess ‘hidden powers’.Human beings tend to suffer from the‘passive fallacy’, the notion that we are mere products of the material world and that the material world is the ultimate reality.For a large proportion of our lives our consciousness is little more than a mirror that reflects this ‘reality’.It is only in moments of concentration and excitement that we grasp that the real purpose of consciousness is to change the world.Synchronicities, flashes of clairvoyance or precognition or mystical insight, make us aware that our power to change the world is greater than we imagine.This is the most important insight to arise from the study of the paranormal; this is the essence of the ‘occult vision’.By comparison ghosts and spirits seem interesting but not particularly important.”(313)
Thus, having knocked himself off-course, Wilson steadies the boat somewhat and steers it back to more familiar waters.
In the penultimate chapter, ‘Completing the Picture’, Wilson returns to his concept of ‘upside-downness’, taking it a step further:
“…we accept the present moment as if it were complete in itself (327)…If I am bored, that is because life is boring.If I am tired, that is because life is tiring (328-9)….Our underlying, instinctive feeling is that life is grim and difficult and something awful might happen at any moment….It is not simply that our emotions are negative, but that our intellect agrees with them .Our judgement ratifies the ‘upside-down’ view of the world….”(327)
But, says Wilson, the present moment almost always gives us an incomplete picture of life which is in need of ‘completing’:
“This ‘completing’ is the most basic activity of all intelligent beings….But our ‘completing’ activities tend to vary from moment to moment.When I am tired I may watch televisionwithout taking it in: I cannot be bothered to ‘complete’ it.On the other hand when I set out on holiday the world seems to me an extraordinary place….My mind is now doing its ‘completing’ work with enthusiasm and efficiency.”(328)
The result of this insight is not a state of constant euphoria but “…a calm recognition that life is not difficult …” and that most of our problems can be “…dealt with by using what might be called
[It has not been possible, in an essay of this length, to present the details of this case.Readers who are interested should refer to the above mentioned book and decide for themselves whether Wilson’s ‘conversion’ was justified.]
This implies, of course, that there is life after death and Wilson went on to write Afterlife: an investigation of the evidence for life after death in 1985 (London: Harrap Ltd.) in which he concluded that evidence points unmistakably to survival.
In the light of these revelations, Wilson uses the next three chapters to take a ‘new’ look at witchcraft, magic, possession, multiple personality, astral projection and spiritualism, asking finally:
“…how far does it matter whether there is a ‘psychic world’, whether spirits exist, whether reincarnation is a reality, whether mediums really contact the dead?….What is interesting about the paranormal is its suggestion that we possess ‘hidden powers’.Human beings tend to suffer from the‘passive fallacy’, the notion that we are mere products of the material world and that the material world is the ultimate reality.For a large proportion of our lives our consciousness is little more than a mirror that reflects this ‘reality’.It is only in moments of concentration and excitement that we grasp that the real purpose of consciousness is to change the world.Synchronicities, flashes of clairvoyance or precognition or mystical insight, make us aware that our power to change the world is greater than we imagine.This is the most important insight to arise from the study of the paranormal; this is the essence of the ‘occult vision’.By comparison ghosts and spirits seem interesting but not particularly important.”(313)
Thus, having knocked himself off-course, Wilson steadies the boat somewhat and steers it back to more familiar waters.
In the penultimate chapter, ‘Completing the Picture’, Wilson returns to his concept of ‘upside-downness’, taking it a step further:
“…we accept the present moment as if it were complete in itself (327)…If I am bored, that is because life is boring.If I am tired, that is because life is tiring (328-9)….Our underlying, instinctive feeling is that life is grim and difficult and something awful might happen at any moment….It is not simply that our emotions are negative, but that our intellect agrees with them .Our judgement ratifies the ‘upside-down’ view of the world….”(327)
But, says Wilson, the present moment almost always gives us an incomplete picture of life which is in need of ‘completing’:
“This ‘completing’ is the most basic activity of all intelligent beings….But our ‘completing’ activities tend to vary from moment to moment.When I am tired I may watch televisionwithout taking it in: I cannot be bothered to ‘complete’ it.On the other hand when I set out on holiday the world seems to me an extraordinary place….My mind is now doing its ‘completing’ work with enthusiasm and efficiency.”(328)
The result of this insight is not a state of constant euphoria but “…a calm recognition that life is not difficult …” and that most of our problems can be “…dealt with by using what might be called
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