0:05

Welcome to the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast

0:07

AM paranormal podcast network.

0:09

This is the place to be if you're ready

0:11

for the best podcasts of the paranormal,

0:14

curious, and sometimes unexplained.

0:17

Now listen to this.

0:25

Welcome to our podcast. Please

0:27

be aware the thoughts and opinions expressed

0:30

by the host are their thoughts and opinions

0:33

only and do not reflect those

0:35

of iHeartMedia, iHeartRadio,

0:38

Coast to Coast AM, employees

0:40

of premier networks, or their sponsors

0:42

and associates. We would like to encourage

0:45

you to do your own research and discover

0:47

the subject matter for yourself.

0:56

Hi.

0:56

I'm Sandra Champlain. For over

0:59

twenty five years years, I've been on a journey

1:01

to prove the existence of life after

1:04

death. On each episode,

1:06

we'll discuss the reasons we now

1:08

know that our loved ones have survived

1:10

physical death, and so will

1:13

we. Welcome to Shades

1:15

of the Afterlife. I love stories

1:18

of near death experiences, and

1:20

I have a sneaky suspicion.

1:22

You do too.

1:23

I want to read to you a few short

1:26

stories that are real. This

1:28

happened to a five year old blind

1:31

girl, she says, I

1:33

slowly breathed in the water and

1:35

became unconscious. A beautiful

1:37

lady dressed in bright white light

1:40

pulled me out. The lady looked

1:43

into my eyes and asked me

1:45

what I wanted. I was unable

1:47

to think of anything until it occurred

1:50

to me to travel around the

1:52

lake. As I did, I

1:54

saw a detail that I would have never

1:56

seen in my real life.

1:59

I could go any where, even to the

2:01

tops of the trees, simply

2:03

by intending to go there. I

2:06

was legally blind. For the first

2:08

time. I was able to see leaves

2:10

on trees, birds feathers,

2:13

birds, eyes, details

2:15

on the telephone poles, and

2:17

what was in people's backyards.

2:20

I was seeing for the very first

2:22

time. Here's another story.

2:25

During my surgery, I felt myself

2:27

lift for my body and go above

2:30

the operating table. The doctor told

2:32

me later they had kept my heart

2:34

open and stopped for a

2:36

very long time, and they had a great

2:39

amount of difficulty getting my heart

2:41

started again. That must have been

2:43

when I left my body, because I could

2:45

see doctors nervously trying

2:47

to get my heart going. It was so

2:50

strange to be detached from my physical

2:52

body. I was curious about

2:55

what they were doing, but not really concerned.

2:58

Then, as I drifted farther away,

3:00

I saw my father at the head of the table.

3:03

He looked up at me, which did give

3:05

me a surprise because he had

3:07

been dead for almost a year.

3:10

Another story, I approached the

3:12

boundary. No explanation was

3:14

necessary for me to understand

3:17

at the age of ten, that once I

3:19

crossed the boundary, I could never

3:21

come back. I was more than thrilled

3:24

to cross. I intended to cross,

3:26

but my ancestors over another

3:29

boundary caught my attention. They

3:31

were talking to me in telepathy,

3:34

which really caught my attention. I

3:36

was born profoundly deaf and

3:38

now had all hearing that

3:41

my family members did, all

3:43

of which new sign language when

3:45

I was alive. Now I

3:47

could read or communicate with about

3:50

twenty ancestors of mine and

3:52

others through telepathic methods.

3:55

It overwhelmed me. I could not believe

3:58

how many people I could tell simultaneously.

4:02

One more, I almost died.

4:05

Back in June of twenty twenty, I

4:07

was hit by a car while riding my motorcycle.

4:10

I blacked out, was hospitalized

4:13

for a month and a half, and my leg

4:16

even got amputated. I

4:18

don't know if the accident itself

4:20

did this to me, or the pain and

4:22

trauma did, or the place that

4:24

I went to when I blacked out. But

4:27

I swear I've gotten so much smarter

4:30

and more in tune with everything.

4:33

I am hyper detail oriented,

4:35

I have crazy motivational drive,

4:38

and I also feel like I can just understand

4:41

things others can't. I see

4:43

the world so differently now. I

4:45

can sense people's energies and

4:47

it helps me understand what people are going

4:50

through. There definitely is a

4:52

change to me after my near death

4:54

experience. We love hearing

4:56

about near death experiences and

4:58

can be inspired by these stories

5:01

and reunions, and they help us

5:03

know that we go on after

5:05

death. There is a term called after

5:08

effects of a near death experience

5:10

that people have, and often we can

5:12

share these effects by hearing

5:15

stories. After effects

5:17

include such things like a reduced

5:19

fear of death, increased belief

5:21

in life after death, interest

5:24

in the meaning of life, acceptance

5:26

of others, and becoming more

5:28

loving and empathic. The

5:31

majority of people make their lives

5:33

about helping others through life.

5:35

Some after effects happen immediately,

5:38

others may take years to fully

5:40

manifest. Doctor Pim van

5:42

Lommel did a large study and divided

5:44

survivors of cardiac arrest into

5:47

a group that had near death experiences

5:49

and a group that did not. The

5:51

after effects of both groups were assessed

5:54

two in eight years after

5:57

their cardiac arrests. The group

6:00

of survivors with near death

6:02

experiences were statistically

6:05

much more likely to have a reduced

6:07

fear of death, increased belief

6:09

in the afterlife, interest in the

6:11

meaning of life, acceptance of

6:14

others, and were much more loving,

6:16

where there didn't seem to be much

6:19

change in the values of those who

6:21

didn't. It is remarkable that near

6:23

death experiences often occurred

6:25

during only minutes or

6:28

seconds of unconsciousness, yet

6:30

commonly result in lifelong

6:33

transformations of beliefs

6:35

and values. Ninety nine

6:38

percent of near death experiences

6:40

said that their experience was real.

6:43

But can a near death experience

6:45

unlock any extraordinary

6:48

abilities in a person? Today,

6:50

on our show, I am so happy

6:53

to share a special story of

6:55

a physician who was struck by lightning

6:58

only to receive a passion for

7:00

music. I can't wait for you to hear it.

7:02

Also, two of my personal favorite

7:05

stories are of doctor Rajiev

7:07

Parti and Anita Morjani.

7:10

Anita Morjani, author of the book

7:13

dying to be me, which I

7:15

highly recommend. Had cancer

7:17

that had spread throughout her body and

7:20

doctor said it was too late to save

7:22

her. All of Anita's

7:24

organs had shut down and she entered

7:26

into a coma. She witnessed

7:29

so much in her near death experience, including

7:32

being encouraged to return to life

7:34

by her deceased father and her

7:36

best friend who told her

7:38

that she needed to return and live

7:41

her life fearlessly. When

7:43

she came out of this coma, her tumors

7:46

shrank by about seventy percent

7:49

within four days, and within five

7:51

weeks she was cancer free and

7:54

was released from the hospital. Now,

7:56

she did have to spend a few months in

7:58

physiotherapy to regain her strength

8:00

and to use oliver muscles and limbs again.

8:03

But today, in twenty twenty

8:05

four, Anita Morjani remains

8:08

cancer free and makes her life

8:10

about helping other people

8:13

and sharing the reality of

8:15

the afterlife. Doctor

8:17

Rajiv Partis was chief

8:20

of anesthesiology at Hart

8:22

Hospital in Bakersfield, California.

8:24

He loved his wealth and

8:27

the prestige that his job gave him.

8:29

He lived in a mansion, had several

8:32

luxury cars, and was able to

8:34

purchase anything he wanted.

8:36

In August of two thousand and eight,

8:39

everything changed in his life when

8:41

he was diagnosed with prostate cancer

8:44

due to an infection. He was

8:46

admitted into the hospital where he

8:48

had his near death experience. Although

8:51

deep from anesthesia, he

8:53

was aware that his consciousness had

8:55

somehow left his body. From

8:58

a vantage point near the ceiling, he could

9:00

see the surgeon cut him open and

9:02

all of the operating room personnel

9:05

cover their faces from the odor

9:08

that his infected abdomen

9:10

seeped throughout the room. He said

9:12

his senses became so acute

9:14

that he could hear, see and smell

9:16

things inside and outside

9:19

of the operating room. He even

9:21

heard the anesthesiologist tell

9:23

a dirty joke that made

9:26

the doctor blush when he later

9:28

repeated what he heard in

9:30

the operating room. His spirit

9:33

left the operating room, and, although

9:35

still in the United States,

9:38

he drifted into India, where

9:40

he could hear his mother and sister talking

9:43

about what they were preparing for dinner

9:45

that night. Fear ended

9:47

up finding its way into

9:50

his experience. He had

9:52

the feeling of being pulled into

9:54

darkness filled with screams

9:56

and sounds of fighting. Eventually,

9:59

he saw a white light in

10:02

the distance and instinctively

10:04

began praying. The white light

10:06

turned to a light of love, and he

10:09

was shown his life that he was not

10:11

practicing forgiveness or

10:13

compassion to himself or others.

10:16

He soon felt very sorry for the lack

10:18

of kindness and his behavior, wishing

10:21

he could have done certain things differently in

10:23

his life. His book Dying

10:25

to Wake Up tells the story

10:28

of him being an anesthesiologist,

10:31

making people fall asleep before

10:33

surgery and now after

10:36

the near death experience, waking

10:38

them up as to who they are and

10:40

what their life is for. There's much

10:43

more to his story, of course, but he

10:45

shares what he calls the near

10:47

death Manifesto. One

10:50

Consciousness can exist outside

10:52

the body. Two there

10:54

is life after death. Three

10:57

Our experiences in life

11:00

shape our current reality.

11:02

Four We are all connected to each

11:04

other because we are all made of the

11:06

one and same energy that

11:08

manifests as differentiated

11:10

matter. Five Divine

11:13

beings exist and help and

11:15

guide us. Six there

11:17

are different levels of consciousness, and

11:20

seven there is one all

11:22

pervading, supreme love and intelligence

11:25

that is the source of the entire universe,

11:28

and that love is the supreme

11:30

source of creation. In their

11:33

latest book, Proof of Life

11:35

After Life, seven reasons to

11:37

believe there is an after life.

11:40

Doctor Raymond Moody and Paul Perry

11:42

share this. There are many stories

11:45

of near death experiences leading

11:47

to the life changing acquisition of

11:50

new talents, the changing of professions,

11:53

or the overcoming of something

11:55

like crippling anxiety. Why

11:58

these spontaneous improvements take

12:00

place is not known. Some have speculated

12:03

that the brain changes due to neural

12:05

plasticity, the reorganization

12:07

of the brain's neuronal connections

12:10

that sometimes takes place after

12:12

a stroke or the brain trauma of

12:14

an accident. Neural plasticity

12:17

proves to us that the brain is capable

12:19

of reorganizing or rerouting

12:22

its neurons to compensate for traumatic

12:24

damage. Yet for neural reorganization

12:27

to be the cause of these spontaneous

12:29

improvements is most likely impossible.

12:32

After all, successfully rewiring

12:35

the brain after neurological

12:38

damage can take substantial

12:40

rehab, and then effects of

12:42

original damage most often

12:45

still remain. There is clearly,

12:47

to me and a growing number of researchers

12:50

something more happening here.

12:53

It's time for our break, and when

12:55

we come back, we are going to hear

12:58

the incredible story of

13:00

Tony Sechoria and his

13:03

after effects of being struck by

13:05

lightning. We'll be right back. You're

13:07

listening to Shades of the Afterlife

13:10

on the iHeartRadio and Coast

13:12

to Coast AM Paranormal Podcast

13:15

Network.

13:21

Keep it here on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast

13:23

AM Paranormal Podcast Network.

13:25

Sander Champlain will be right back.

13:35

We are happy to announce that our Coast to Coast

13:38

AM official YouTube

13:40

channel has now reached over

13:42

three hundred thousand subscribers.

13:45

You can listen to the first hour of recent

13:48

and past shows for free,

13:50

so head on over to the Coast to COASTAM

13:53

dot com website and hit

13:55

the YouTube icon at the top of

13:57

the page. This is free show

14:00

audio, so don't wait. Coast

14:03

to COASTAM dot com is

14:05

where you want to be. Hi,

14:17

it's doctor Sky.

14:19

Keep it right here on the iHeartRadio

14:22

and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal

14:24

Podcast Network.

14:40

Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.

14:42

I'm Sandra Champlain and I'm really

14:45

excited I get to share this next

14:47

story with you. Doctor Tony

14:49

Sechoria is a well known

14:52

orthopedic surgeon, very

14:54

busy man no particular interest

14:56

in the afterlife. When he was struck

14:59

by lightn in nineteen ninety

15:01

four. The bolt was enough to kill

15:03

him, but it didn't. What it

15:05

did do is leave him with

15:08

a sudden craving for classical

15:10

music, in particular the

15:13

piano. Doctor Tony is

15:15

regular, down to earth, and

15:17

I know he'll enjoy his story

15:20

just as much as I do.

15:21

My wife normally would have a

15:23

big party every August. In

15:26

this particular August in nineteen ninety

15:28

four was going to be at a place

15:30

called Sleepy Hollow Lake in

15:33

upstate New York, about twenty five people,

15:36

lots of kids running around, and my

15:39

wife had rented a pavilion, and

15:41

I was elected the cook. And

15:44

that's the way the days started. As

15:47

I was out working the barbecue,

15:49

I thought I hadn't checked on my mom

15:52

because she was not there. I

15:54

thought I'd better go call her. So I

15:56

got somebody to cover the barbecue, and I walked

15:59

around in front of the building and

16:01

there was a pay phone attached to it, and

16:03

I picked up the phone and I dial

16:05

a number and let it ring four or five six

16:08

times, and she never picked up. So

16:10

I thought, oh, I'll try again later. And

16:13

as I took the phone away from my

16:15

face, I heard a

16:17

huge crack, and

16:20

I saw this big flash of light come

16:22

out of the phone and hit me in the

16:24

face, and knew exactly what

16:26

it was, a lightning strike. What

16:28

I hadn't realized because I was paying

16:31

attention to the grill, was that a storm

16:33

cloud had brewed up over the lake that we

16:35

were next to, and I

16:37

hadn't been paying attention. I

16:39

see the big flash of lake come out of the phone, hits

16:42

me in the face and throws me back like a rag

16:44

doll. It really threw

16:46

me backwards. And that's when things really

16:48

got interesting, because as

16:50

I was being thrown backwards, all

16:53

of a sudden, I had this very strange sensation

16:56

of moving forwards. I

16:58

remember standing there thinking, how

17:00

is this possible. I know I got hit. I

17:03

saw it and knew I'd been thrown

17:05

back like a rag doll. And

17:07

here I am standing, and I'm

17:09

looking around and look at the phone, and the phone

17:11

is just dangling. Nothing's

17:14

making any sense. At that point,

17:16

I hear my mother in law screaming, and

17:19

I'm down at the bottom of the stairs and

17:21

everybody else is up on the first floor.

17:24

All of a sudden, she's running down the stairs right

17:26

at me, and I'm thinking, it's

17:28

not good when your mother in law's screaming and running

17:30

at you. Is she got down in

17:32

front of me. I could tell that

17:35

she couldn't see me because

17:38

she was looking off to her left.

17:40

As she got to the bottom of the stairs, he

17:42

was like, I wasn't even there, and she

17:45

just took off to the left, and I thought, what the hell

17:47

is going on? And so I started

17:49

to follow her. And I took a few

17:51

steps following her, and

17:53

all of a sudden, I'm confronted with myself

17:56

on the ground. I remember looking

17:58

down and going, oh shit,

18:01

I'm dead. It was a shock,

18:03

I guess all of my life, I thought that

18:05

when you died there would be

18:07

some sort of notification, who

18:10

knows what it was, but I didn't expect

18:13

to have it not even be known.

18:16

I thought there'd be some of bells or whistles that would

18:18

go off, but there was absolutely nothing.

18:21

So I'm standing there and I'm looking at

18:23

myself on the ground as

18:25

this is happening. My mind is

18:27

racing like crazy, and I'm trying to

18:29

make sense to this, and all of a sudden, I'm

18:32

saying to myself, wait a

18:34

minute, I'm thinking, just like

18:36

a normally would. I'm obviously

18:38

not in that body that's on the ground.

18:41

I'm standing out here. I

18:43

can hear everybody. I can see everybody,

18:46

but nobody can see or hear me, and I'm

18:48

trying to get their attention and

18:51

nothing seemed to work. And

18:53

then I saw this lady who

18:56

actually was waiting to use the

18:58

phone behind me. She started

19:00

to get down and do CPR. Turns

19:02

out she was a nurse from one of the local

19:05

hospitals. And help fortuitous

19:07

is that get struck by lightning

19:09

to have somebody waiting to save it from

19:12

going to the other side. So she got

19:14

down and she starts doing what she's supposed

19:16

to do. And at this point, I'm

19:18

thinking, nobody can see me, nobody can

19:21

hear me. I'm feeling stupid,

19:23

and I thought I'm going to go check on my family

19:25

because they were upstairs. My

19:28

wife and my three kids are up there,

19:30

and I thought, I'm going to go up the stairs and

19:32

see what's going on. So I walk over to the

19:34

stairs and I start to go up, and I get

19:36

to about the third stair and

19:39

I'm looking down at the stairs because I

19:41

was afraid I'm gonna fall face forward

19:43

on the stairs. So I always watch what I'm doing.

19:46

As I'm looking down, I noticed

19:49

that my legs are starting to dissolve,

19:52

and I thought, Wow, this is

19:54

getting really intense, and

19:56

I just kept going up the stairs. By the time I got

19:59

to the top of the stairs, I had

20:01

lost all form. I was just a ball of energy.

20:04

The stairs go off to the left, and I

20:06

said, what the hell, I'm not going to go upstairs.

20:08

I just went through the wall, and

20:11

when I got to the other side of the wall,

20:13

I came out right over the top

20:16

of where my wife was sitting, and

20:18

she's painting children's faces, and I

20:20

made a mental note of where the

20:22

kids were, who was standing where,

20:25

who the kids were in, what pattern they

20:27

were standing in. I don't know

20:29

why I did that, but I did. Later

20:32

on, I verified that was exactly

20:34

the way they were standing. When

20:36

I got to the other side of the room that

20:38

was going on a diagonal, I went through the roof

20:41

and suddenly I'm outside.

20:44

And that's when things really got crazy interesting,

20:47

because it was like I had fallen

20:49

into a river of pure positive

20:52

energy. It wasn't anything

20:54

in this river of energy

20:57

except absolute love

21:00

and absolute peace. It

21:02

was his bluish white light and It had a

21:04

sparkly appearance to it, and it made me think

21:07

of when I was a kid and I'd be swimming in

21:09

a crystal clear stream and

21:11

I'd see the sun shining through

21:13

the water as I was underneath the water. It

21:16

reminded me of that. As I was looking

21:19

at this light energy, I could

21:21

tell what it felt like. And as

21:23

I looked around, I started to see that

21:27

whatever this energy was, it

21:29

actually made up everything. I

21:32

could look at the trees and see the

21:34

energy flowing into the

21:36

trees, and everything was made

21:39

up of whatever this energy was. And I thought

21:42

to myself, I'm thinking, this is the

21:44

God. Energy is what

21:46

everything is made of. It's

21:49

so powerful I could measure this, So

21:51

my science brain's kicking in and going,

21:54

we could look at this. But the more

21:56

I looked at it, I could actually see

21:59

the energy pad and it had a sine

22:01

wave pattern, and I could see it flowing

22:04

and it went through everything. And at this point

22:06

I could tell that I was moving someplace.

22:09

I had no idea where I was going. I

22:11

could feel speed in direction, so

22:15

I was accelerating into something,

22:17

but I had no idea what. At

22:19

this point, I've become absolutely

22:23

euphoric over the fact that this

22:25

is the greatest thing that could ever happen to somebody.

22:28

I had a short period where I

22:30

saw high points and low points in my life,

22:33

almost like a collage of pictures

22:35

just showed me pictures in

22:37

this and this and that, and there wasn't

22:39

a lot of emotion around it. It was just these

22:42

are things that happened in your life that were

22:45

of some significance, and there

22:47

was no explanation other than

22:49

the fact that they just passed on. So

22:52

I settled down and I'm floating

22:54

in this river of pure

22:57

positive energy, and I'm thinking, again,

23:00

this is the greatest thing that could ever happen to somebody,

23:02

And I was just excited about where it was

23:04

going. And then all of a sudden,

23:07

it was like somebody flipped a switch. I

23:10

was back in my body

23:12

and I was pissed. I

23:14

was like, no, don't make me go back.

23:17

You can't do this to me. I

23:20

quickly realized that it's not up to me. I'm

23:23

laying there on the ground and in

23:25

a place where it hit me in the face and

23:27

came out my foot. It felt like

23:29

somebody had taken hot pokers and stuck

23:32

them in both of those places. But I'm still

23:34

unconscious, and the lady who

23:36

was next to me had stopped CPR. She

23:38

just kneeling next to me. But I still

23:40

can't open my eyes look at anybody.

23:43

So it took several minutes before

23:45

I had enough mental

23:48

function to be able to open my eyes

23:50

and say anything. And at that point I just

23:52

embarrassed myself because the

23:54

first thing I said to this lady who's

23:56

kneeling next to me and saved my life, I

23:59

said, it's it's okay, I'm a doctor, and

24:01

she just kind of laughed and she

24:04

said, hell, you weren't a minute ago. And

24:06

I thought, okay, I'm just making a fool

24:08

of myself, so I'm going to shut up, which

24:10

I did, and of course the

24:12

police and the ambulance came, and I said, no,

24:14

I'm not going. When you get struck

24:17

by lightning, either alive or dead, there's not much

24:19

in between. At that point, I talked

24:21

to my family and I said, take me home, let me see

24:23

my cardiologists, to my neurologists,

24:26

and let's let me just get out

24:28

of this. So they took

24:30

me home and I saw my doctors and

24:33

everybody said the same thing. Are you lucky to be

24:35

here, I was like, okay,

24:38

but I was tormented by what

24:40

did it mean? When I started to think

24:42

about it, And everything in life

24:45

is a series of probabilities. I

24:47

started thinking about, what's the probability

24:49

of those bultiple lightning several

24:52

million volts worth striking

24:55

a building losing enough of its current

24:57

by the time it gets to you that

25:00

it doesn't turn you into a French fry,

25:03

It just stops your heart. And

25:05

what's the probability of having

25:07

a nurse standing behind you so

25:10

that just in case you got a little

25:12

too much, somebody was going to

25:14

be there to jump start your heart again. When

25:17

I started looking at all this stuff, I'm thinking,

25:19

there's nothing random about this. As

25:21

Einstein used to say, God does not

25:24

throw dice, and that's true.

25:26

I'm a firm believer that everything

25:28

happens for a reason. But I was given

25:31

no reasons. I had no idea, and

25:34

I was haunted by the fact that

25:36

this thing happened and I had

25:38

no idea why and what it meant or

25:40

what I was supposed to take from it. And

25:42

then shortly after that, it

25:45

was about two weeks after the event, After

25:48

the lightning, it took me about a

25:50

week to get the circuits running

25:52

again properly. That

25:55

first week, I could look right at

25:57

you and say, I

25:59

know who you are. I'll be damn

26:01

if I can find your name. It's locked

26:03

in a box some place up there and I can't

26:06

get to it. And there were a lot of things

26:08

like that. I knew that I knew something, but I

26:10

couldn't get to where that finle

26:13

was. After a week that disappeared,

26:16

it seemed like everything was back to normal. But

26:19

about another week or two after

26:21

that, I started having this really

26:24

incredible desire to hear classical

26:27

piano music.

26:28

This is a good time to take our break because

26:30

he has a lot more to say about

26:33

what happens. This is

26:35

the after effect of a near

26:37

death experience of orthopedic

26:39

surgeon Tony Sekoria.

26:42

So we'll be right back. You're listening to

26:45

Shades of the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio

26:48

and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal

26:50

Podcast Network. Don't

26:59

go anywhere. There's more Shades

27:01

of the Afterlife coming right up.

27:08

The best afterlife information you can

27:10

get. Well, You're all Shades

27:12

of the Afterlife with Sandra Champlain.

27:18

Hi. This is your followgist. Kevin Randall

27:20

and you're listening to the iHeartRadio and Coast

27:23

to Coast AM Paranormal Podcast

27:25

Network.

27:40

Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.

27:43

I'm Sandra Champagne and you're listening

27:45

to the near death experience of doctor

27:47

Tony Sechoria. We last

27:49

left him recovering from

27:51

being struck by a bolt of lightning. Let's

27:54

see where the story continues.

27:56

Another week or two after that, I

27:58

started having this really incredible

28:01

desire to hear classical piano

28:03

music, which was a really

28:06

strange thing for me because I

28:08

was a kid of the sixties. There was rock and roll

28:10

and there wasn't much of anything else. But all

28:12

of a sudden, I can't do anything

28:15

without thinking about this absolute

28:17

desire to hear this. It was so strong

28:20

that I drove an hour to Albany,

28:22

which was the nearest big city

28:25

that would have classical piano music

28:27

on CDs. I went into

28:29

this music store and as I

28:31

walked in it, it seemed like there was a CD that

28:33

you jumped off the shelf into my hands,

28:36

and it was Vladimir Ashkenazi playing

28:38

his favorite chowpin. At this point,

28:41

I didn't know what to do with all of it. I

28:43

was so taken by this music,

28:46

and I started listening to the CD

28:48

and I listened to it NonStop and

28:50

made everybody else listen to it. I'm sure they

28:52

were sick of hearing it. I just couldn't

28:54

stop. It was just a compulsion that had

28:57

made no sense to me. But within

28:59

a very short period of time of listening

29:01

to this music, I realized that it's

29:03

not going to be enough to listen to

29:06

this music. I need to know how to play

29:08

it, which was a big problem since

29:10

I didn't have a piano and I didn't know how to

29:12

play. The very next day,

29:14

one of where babysitters came to the house and

29:16

said, I'm going to be moving and

29:18

I have this old, upright piano. I need the store

29:21

for a year. Could I store it at

29:23

your house? And I'm thinking, okay,

29:25

this is really getting weird now. So

29:28

all of a sudden, I have a piano. She loads

29:30

the piano in the house, and I'm thinking, now

29:33

I need to learn how to play. So I went and

29:35

bought a couple of books and how to

29:37

try to teach yourself to play, And at the same

29:39

time, I ordered all the sheet music from the

29:41

CD, which is magical.

29:43

Thinking I don't know what the hell I was thinking. Their

29:46

people have been playing this stuff for ten years

29:48

and still wouldn't attempt to do that, but

29:51

didn't seem to matter. I was determined

29:53

to learn how to do this, and so

29:55

I started to try to teach myself. And

29:58

within a few more weeks of

30:00

that, I go into bed as normal,

30:03

But all of a sudden, I have

30:05

this dream. And in this

30:07

dream it was like an out of body

30:09

experience. I'm walking out onto the

30:12

stage and I'm walking toward myself.

30:14

I'm way out on the front edge of the stage.

30:17

I'm giving a concert at this concert

30:19

hall. I'm listening to this music

30:21

that I'm playing, and as I'm walking up behind

30:24

myself, the thought comes to me

30:26

that this is not somebody else's music, this

30:28

is mine, and I thought,

30:31

okay, so I start

30:33

listening intently to it. I

30:36

walked up behind myself and I'm

30:38

listening to what I'm playing, and I'm

30:40

watching everything, and I'm looking at

30:42

the concert hall and the

30:45

ending had this loud, crashing ending.

30:47

It woke me up, so I got up

30:50

and I sat on the edge of the bed and I

30:52

looked around and it was three point fifteen in the

30:54

morning. I walked out to the piano,

30:57

and I thought, let me see if I can plunk some

30:59

of this app out that I just heard.

31:02

I had no idea I had

31:04

to write music. I didn't have to read music. I

31:06

sat there and I could plunk out a few

31:09

notes of what I heard, but I didn't

31:11

even know how to write down what they were.

31:14

So I said the hell with this. I went to bed. I

31:17

woke up always it by thirty

31:19

six o'clock because that was my time to get up and

31:21

get ready for work. From that moment

31:24

on, whenever I

31:26

went near that piano, the

31:28

music from the dream would start to play

31:31

in my head. So whenever I sat

31:33

down at the piano, it was

31:35

like a tape recording. It would just start. If

31:38

I didn't pay attention to it,

31:40

it would become intrusive. It would actually

31:42

start playing when I was trying to

31:44

work or when I was trying to do something else. So

31:47

I learned very quickly that it was kind

31:49

of like a two year old. He really had to pay

31:51

attention to it or there was going

31:53

to be some repercussions from

31:55

it. So this process went

31:57

on, and I continued trying to

31:59

teach myself, and one

32:02

day I'm banging away at the piano

32:04

and my daughter's best friend, Jackie,

32:06

was over at the house and her

32:08

mom was coming by to pick her up, and

32:10

she came in the house. She

32:13

heard me on the piano, and she came in and said,

32:15

what are you doing? And I said,

32:18

I'm trying to learn this piece of music. It

32:20

was called a fantasy. I PROMPTU a

32:22

piece of chowpin and I

32:24

said, I don't understand why the

32:27

hands don't line up in this piece of

32:29

music. Why would somebody write a piece of music

32:31

where the hands don't line up? And

32:33

she said, they're not supposed

32:36

to. It's called a poly rhythm.

32:39

I had never heard of that word before.

32:41

Why would anyone do that? She

32:43

said, I'm not even going to try to explain this to you.

32:46

You need to get a teacher. So at

32:48

that point she gave me the name of Sandy

32:50

McCain, who was the chairman of

32:53

music at Haartwick College. In

32:55

oneon to New York, where we lived. I

32:57

called up Sandy and told her this whole story

33:00

and asked her if she'd take on an

33:02

old guy to try to teach him some piano.

33:05

She did, and we started working

33:07

two hours a week. The only

33:09

time we had in common was five

33:12

o'clock, so five o'clock was our

33:14

piano time, five o'clock

33:16

in the morning. And I'm sure that her

33:18

family was not real happy with me, but

33:21

that was the best we could do to meet the two

33:23

schedules. So this went on for

33:25

quite some time. As I'm

33:28

learning to play, I'm also

33:30

working on the music from this dream. As

33:33

I learned how to do things, i would write

33:35

down a measure or two and I'd stuff

33:37

it in a drawer someplace, thinking someday

33:40

I'll get back to all of this. I

33:42

kept working on learning how to play, and

33:45

I started going to a music camp, piano

33:47

camp for adults in Bennington,

33:49

Vermont, which was called a Sonata,

33:52

and it's a group of people. They

33:54

would meet four or five six times a year,

33:57

different people at different times,

33:59

and it's all people that are

34:01

absolutely obsessed with piano

34:04

and this is their week of indulging

34:06

themselves. So I started going

34:09

to that in two thousand and two. In

34:11

two thousand and six, when I went, the

34:13

owner's sister, Erica

34:16

vanderlin Feider, was the number

34:18

one salesperson for Steinway in

34:20

New York City and she had just

34:23

left Steinway and went to Bosendorf

34:25

for her, and she was there at the

34:27

piano camp and she brought five pianos

34:29

in for people to play on, which

34:31

was an absolute treat. We got talking

34:34

about all of this stuff and

34:36

the music and the music

34:38

from the dream and the things that I was working

34:41

on. Afterwards, she said to me,

34:43

there's only one person that can tell his story,

34:46

and that's Oliver Sacks. At the time, I

34:48

didn't know who Oliver Sacks was other

34:50

than the fact that he wrote the book Awakenings

34:52

when he figured out how to treat Parkinson's

34:55

disease. He is a famous neurologist,

34:57

and I didn't think anything more of it. I

35:00

went about my normal business. In

35:03

June, I get a phone call from

35:05

Oliver Sacks. I'm like, this

35:07

can't be real. Oliver says,

35:10

I've heard about this lightning

35:12

story and I'd like to have you come down in

35:14

New York City to interview

35:16

you. Like you to be one of my patients. I

35:18

have a collection of people like

35:20

you who have had unusual things happen.

35:23

And I said, sure, that would be great. So

35:26

in August of that year, two

35:28

thousand and six, I went down to see

35:30

Oliver Sacks, and I got to spend the whole day

35:32

with him, which is an absolute

35:34

treasure. This was a man who

35:37

could think circles around anybody I knew,

35:39

including myself. We spent

35:42

the entire day together, which

35:44

I will never forget. And at the end

35:46

of the day, we're standing in the doorway

35:48

and saying goodbye, and he looked

35:50

at me, and he had this piercing way of

35:53

looking at people. He

35:55

looked at me and he says, the music

35:57

from the dream went from an awful lot of

35:59

trouble to get here. The least

36:01

you can do is write it. I

36:04

was so taken with what he said.

36:06

I went right home, and

36:08

it was about three hours to get back home,

36:11

so I had plenty of time to think about it. But

36:13

when I got home the next day, I

36:15

went right out and bought a music

36:17

writing program called Sibelius,

36:19

which is the equivalent of music

36:21

writing for dummies. If you have

36:24

an electric piano, you can hook this thing up

36:26

so that you can play something and the

36:28

music actually appears on the screen. So

36:31

that was the way I started, because by

36:33

that point I had gotten to where I

36:35

could play some parts of the

36:38

music from the dream, but I had no idea

36:40

how to write it. I spent the next

36:42

seven months, every

36:45

minute that I wasn't working, writing

36:47

down this music. My goal was to get

36:49

it written for my next

36:52

May piano camp. That was

36:54

my goal. So when piano camp came

36:56

around in May, I had finished the

36:58

music and played it for

37:01

my piano friends. At

37:04

this piano camp. Everybody

37:06

liked it, and I thought, Okay, this is pretty

37:08

cool. While I was there,

37:11

I got a call from Oliver and

37:13

he says, I wanted to ask your permission

37:15

to use your story in my book, so

37:18

I don't have anything to hide. Sure,

37:20

go ahead, he said, good, because you're

37:23

chapter one and it's coming out July

37:26

twenty third. Sure enough,

37:28

my story was published in the

37:30

New Yorker magazine. At

37:32

that point, all hell broke loose

37:35

because I hadn't been telling a lot

37:37

of people about this story, and because

37:39

I didn't want people to think I was crazy. Suddenly

37:41

it's got taken out of the closet and thrown

37:44

out for everybody to look at. About

37:47

the week after it came out, I got a call from

37:49

a guy named Carlton Clay. Carlton

37:51

was the head of the music department at State

37:54

University of New York in Oneonta.

37:57

He said, would you consider playing the music

37:59

for the class? And I thought,

38:02

I'll do that. It seemed like it

38:04

was another month or so after

38:06

that. Carlton calls again and

38:08

he says, you won't believe it. I'm

38:11

just getting hammered with people calling

38:13

here and everybody wants more and more. He

38:16

said, would you consider doing a concert

38:19

at the Performing Arts Center? And I said

38:21

no, I don't have the faintest idea how

38:24

to do something like that. I said, I'm not musically

38:26

trained. I'm not prepared. I have

38:28

no idea where to start. And somehow

38:31

he conned me into doing it. I

38:33

said, okay, I'll do it. So

38:35

the next phone call I make is I call Sandy,

38:38

my music teacher, and I said, can

38:40

you get me ready for it? And she said

38:42

it's going to be a lot of work. She said, you got

38:45

to be prepared to put four hours a

38:47

day into getting ready for

38:49

this. And I'm like, okay, we

38:51

start on this process. We would

38:53

go up and to the Performing Arts

38:55

Center and she would make me walk out

38:57

on stage and make me walk off. She would

39:00

make me talk to the crowd and then make

39:02

me play the music. And I can still

39:04

hear. She'd be up in our top row

39:06

of the seats and I'd be playing

39:09

away and she'd go.

39:09

I can't hear you.

39:11

This is going to be no fun. But

39:14

we worked along. And then a

39:16

few weeks before the concert, Carlton

39:19

calls me again and he says

39:21

things are changing again, and I said,

39:24

what are you doing? He says,

39:26

a BBC one wants

39:28

to come, and so does German

39:30

Television and so does Granata

39:33

Media.

39:34

I love this guy. We need to take a

39:36

break and then we'll be back. Plus

39:39

I have a surprise at the end. You're listening

39:41

to Shades of the Afterlife on

39:43

the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast

39:46

AM heir Normal Podcast

39:48

Network.

40:01

Stay there, Sandra will be right back.

40:08

Hey, it's the Wizard of Weird Joshua

40:10

P. Warren. Don't forget to check out my

40:13

show Strange Things

40:15

each week as I bring you the world

40:17

of the truly, amazing and bizarre

40:20

right here on the iHeartRadio

40:22

and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal

40:24

Podcast Network.

40:30

This is Afterlife Expert Daniel

40:32

Braakley, and you're listening to the iHeartRadio

40:35

and Coast to Coast AM Paronormal

40:38

Podcast Network.

40:53

Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.

40:55

I'm Sandra Champlaine. Orthopedic

40:57

surgeon. Tony Sechoria

41:00

gets hit by a bolt of lightning, has

41:02

a near death experience, and now

41:04

an uncontrollable urge

41:06

to learn and play piano. Next,

41:09

he manages to write down

41:11

the music from a dream, and next

41:14

they want him to play in a concert.

41:17

Here's what happens.

41:18

A few weeks before the concert, Carlton

41:21

calls me again and he says

41:23

things are changing again, and I said,

41:26

what are you doing? He says, BBC

41:28

one wants to come, and Sodas

41:31

German Television, and so does Granada

41:33

Media. So there's three huge

41:36

sets that want to come and film this thing.

41:39

I was like, oh my god, I've come too

41:41

far. Now what am I going to do? I

41:43

said, okay, loone comes the

41:45

concert day, which actually turned out to be my

41:47

birthday. Anyway, there's three television

41:50

crews. I remember going to the

41:52

green room right beforehand,

41:54

and I remember sitting here and

41:56

I'm talking to God and the angels anybody

41:58

that wants to listen. I said, you

42:01

guys put me through a lot to get me here.

42:03

I said, don't embarrass us both

42:06

and leave me out there without a lot

42:08

of help. Thankfully, I

42:10

managed to get through it the music

42:12

from the dream and a couple of other pieces

42:15

that I had written along the way, and

42:17

ever since then, it's taken on a life

42:19

of its own. I've played that

42:22

music all over the country. It's

42:24

interesting the reactions that

42:26

I get to it. People will

42:29

come up afterwards and

42:31

tell me about they see visions or

42:33

they feel certain things. And

42:35

I've even had some people ask if they

42:38

could come and lay on the floor underneath

42:40

the piano so they can feel the vibrations

42:43

of it, because there's something in the frequencies

42:46

of the music that stimulates

42:48

certain brain activity or certain

42:50

behaviors. I think there's more

42:52

to the music than I have any

42:55

concept of. It's so

42:57

far over my head. I do

43:00

believe that there are healing

43:02

frequencies, and there are frequencies

43:05

that stimulate brain activity

43:07

in people, and it's just

43:09

based on the things that people say.

43:12

I have been searching for

43:15

an understanding of how all this

43:17

fits together ever since it happened,

43:20

and I've literally read

43:22

hundreds of books trying to understand.

43:25

I think what it really comes down to is we

43:28

have no real concept of

43:31

how the brain works, and how it's connected

43:34

to other things in other places, and

43:37

the frequencies that exist in

43:39

the ether, the quantum field

43:42

as some people call it, and

43:44

how all of it interacts. So

43:47

is some of the aspects of this music

43:49

about helping people to

43:51

reprogram some part of the brain that they

43:54

don't have access to or could help

43:56

in their evolution. I don't

43:59

know, or like myself, you hear music

44:01

and the music's coming from some place. Where

44:03

is it coming from? And how does it make its way into

44:05

my brain? And again, there's a

44:08

lot of people that are starting to believe that

44:10

this memory exists

44:12

in the quantum field, and nobody really understands

44:15

what that is exactly, and

44:18

how we communicate with it is a

44:20

whole other black box. The

44:22

other thing that did come out of it is that

44:25

I can feel people's energy,

44:27

their aoram as other people would call

44:29

it. It feels like static electricity

44:32

out of not having a better word to

44:34

describe it. If somebody

44:36

has something wrong with their

44:38

shoulder, for example, if

44:41

I happen to bring my hand near their shoulder,

44:43

I'll feel this distortion

44:46

of that electrical energy, and

44:48

so if I move down the arm, it'll

44:51

disappear. But as I get closer to where

44:53

the problem is, I can actually

44:55

bring somebody to tears with it. There

44:57

are some things that I don't have it a

45:00

real understanding of, but I

45:02

just noticed that they exist, and

45:05

I use them as tools

45:07

to help. If I'm trying to figure out what

45:09

somebody's problem is, I can

45:12

use that as a way to

45:14

narrow the focus of what I'm

45:16

looking at. I've had flashes

45:19

of knowing things that I

45:22

have no way of knowing, a

45:24

feeling somebody's going to call and the phone

45:27

rings, or I walk over and I pick up the phone and thereonic.

45:30

There's no way to quantitate any of that, And

45:34

there are enough people that have things like that

45:36

happen anyway that you

45:38

don't know whether it's meaningful or

45:40

not. But these

45:42

are things that I didn't really notice before.

45:45

So I'm absolutely certain

45:49

that there is no such thing as death. We

45:51

change forms, but

45:54

our spirit lives on forever. Whoever

45:58

we are, we always are, and that

46:00

I'm absolutely certain of. I

46:02

think that the only real message

46:05

that I have is there is life

46:07

after death. I think it's

46:09

really important to

46:12

have an approach to life that is other

46:15

than self being more concerned

46:18

about others than about the self.

46:21

I think it's a big part of how

46:24

our spirits are supposed to work.

46:26

Thank you, doctor Tony Secoria.

46:29

Now did I hear you?

46:31

Think?

46:32

I wish I could hear that piece of music you

46:34

can here is Lightning Sonata

46:37

with doctor Secoria at

46:39

the piano. Pay attention to your

46:41

emotions and see how it moves

46:44

your soul.

47:21

Incling and

47:30

stay.

47:33

In and

47:41

fifty.

48:42

Th Coca

50:20

in the.

50:27

Name Cola

50:44

Coca the

51:16

look a look at.

52:42

My friend. Anything is possible

52:44

if you believe. Please remember

52:47

to come visit me at We Don't Die dot com.

52:50

I'm Sandra Champlain. Thank

52:52

you for listening to Shades

52:54

of the Afterlife on the iHeart

52:56

Radio and Coast to Coast AM hair

52:59

or podcast network.

53:09

And if you like this episode of Shades of the

53:12

Afterlife, wait until you hear the next one.

53:14

Thank you for listening to the iHeartRadio

53:16

and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal podcast

53:19

Network.