Participant Testimonials

We were not told the questions before the exercise. We were told that the answers would most likely not be perceived as spoken or written words, but probably would be in the form of a series of pictures, or a sense of feeling or knowing, or – in their prime form – some sort of first-person experience. It would be up to us to translate such nonverbal communication into time/space words and physical pictures.

As I asked myself question two (Where and who was I before I entered this physical being?) in Focus 12, my intellect interpreted the question to be about a past life. The question could have just as easily been interpreted to be about a spiritual existence just prior to this physical life. But having understood the question as I did, my intent was to find out who I might have been in an earlier lifetime.

I had never really seriously considered the idea of my reincarnation. But in Focus 12 the question did not seem unusual, and I was willing to experience whatever – regardless of whether I believed in the concept of reincarnation or not. When I was prompted by the voice of Bob Monroe during the exercise to ask, "Where and who was I before I entered this physical being?" I sent this question into the core of my being and awaited a reply.

Almost before I could finish asking, I saw a picture of a bearded man on a ship. I was told, as the expression goes, or came to know or experience or remember, that this was in the 1800s and that I was the captain of this ship. I was dressed in dark-colored woolen clothing and wearing a cap. I had a black, medium-length beard and was slender. The ship was sinking and, as captain, I had seen to the safety of my crew and was dutifully going down with the ship. As I pondered this vision, wondering what else I could learn, Bob Monroe's voice broached the next question and I complied.

After the exercise, the participants returned to the conference room to discuss our experiences. It wasn't until then that I realized the implications of my experience. As I shared my ship's captain experience with the others, I began to remember, in the back of my mind, the origin of my nickname. This remembering was peculiar, because it was as though someone else was telling the ship's captain story while I occupied myself with the memory of my nickname.

Years ago my parents had explained to me that I had been given the nickname Skipper because they were seriously into recreational boating during my infancy, and I had become the "skipper" of the family boat, which was actually named SKIPPER. My needs and desires as an infant became paramount, and all family activities focused on my welfare. In nautical terms, I was the captain, the skipper.

As a part of me continued telling the Focus 12 ship's-captain experience, more memories began whirling around in the back of my mind. Just at the point in the story where my mouth was talking about "going down with the ship," I began to wonder if drowning was a traumatic experience. This immediately brought a memory of snorkeling at the age of twelve or thirteen. I failed a snorkeling class at the YMCA because I had passed out underwater. The instructor had told me that I was different from other people because I did not know, by means of a panic response, when I needed to take a breath. The instructor said that he flunked me out of the class for my own safety.

A similar incident occurred in a friend's swimming pool when I was sixteen. My parents told me after that incident that I should never try scuba diving or any underwater sports. My mom told me that "normal" people, when holding their breath, know when it is time to take a breath because they are overcome by an unrelenting need to take a breath and will do whatever is necessary to satisfy that need. I don't experience these feelings. The memory of all this seemed to answer my wondering about drowning being a traumatic event in the ship's-captain experience.

That other part of me finished telling the story to the group, and I raised my eyes, allowing the group back into my awareness. Several others told of their Focus 12 experiences in the Five Questions exercise. Then someone asked me, "Captain Atwater, did you see anyone else on the ship with you?"
He addressed me as captain out of respect for my military rank, but before I could answer his question, my thoughts flashed through the composite of what was happening – the past-life vision, my nickname Skipper, not drowning, and the respected captain. I finally answered the question, "No, I didn't see anyone else." But the underlying importance of his utterance did not escape me. I remain thankful for his question today. Guidance can seemingly come from all of God's angels.

Although my most memorable experience in this Gateway Voyage was the Focus 12 Five Questions exercise, others have their peak or most meaningful experiences in Focus 21. In the conference room after the Introduction to Focus 21 exercise, one participant started describing his experience by saying, "I went up through the colors and began to visualize a scene with people or beings in white robes. I was so excited! This was Focus 21. Several of these robed beings came forward in turn, presented to me a large open book with the open pages facing me. It was obvious that they wanted me to see what was in the book, but I pushed them aside because I was so excited about being in Focus 21. I didn't want to miss . . . ." He stopped mid-sentence and a bewildered look came over his face.

Remembering the elation of my Gateway Voyage experiences, I came to Guidelines filled with expectations. But this is an entirely different program with a consciousness horizon far beyond those of the Gateway Voyage. Once I realized this, I opened to what the program had to offer.

Working primarily in Focus 21, the program encourages the practical application of communications with one's true nature. With practice, I learned to quickly and directly access whatever information I needed. The goal is to make such lines of communication as direct and natural as possible. During a business meeting, for example, one can calmly and serenely access the communication skills learned and apply them within the context of the situation.

Also included is direct training relating to the out-of-body state and to the use of healing energy for oneself and others. I had my own personalized session during the program in a specially designed isolation chamber in the lab, which is where my travels continued. These are called Personal Resource Exploration Program (PREP) sessions . After completing the Guidelines I was able to do more PREP sessions.

In preparation for one of these sessions, I talked about the fact that for some time I had been having mental visions, dreams, or experiences that I recognized as recurring mental visions, or trips, from my childhood. I was wondering why these episodes were once again drifting into my consciousness. I had also been having stomach problems ever since I retired from the army, and I was seeking some insight into possible metaphysical causes of these symptoms. I set learning about these topics as my goal for a PREP session.

My questions about recurring visions from my youth seemed to be answered with an explanation of a "calendar of time" and the fact that these events aren't always coexistent from a temporal perspective. Apparently, events of our perceived past are not fixed and can be altered by present activities and the future present as well. My awareness of this happening was experienced as recurring visions of what I perceive as the temporal past but in reality are as yet uncompleted events. All that exists is the present. What we call the past is information (as in, in-formation, not solid). What we call the future forms by the laws of probability, intent-consciousness, and present activities (which, of course, becomes part of the past in-formation a moment from now).

During the session, I was reminded (put into my right-mind) that the question of purpose doesn't make sense. I also realized that, rather than using "who, what, why, when, or how," I should simply say in my mind "explain," to solicit the answers to questions I (or an aspect of myself) may have. Apparently, the use of the interrogatives limits the response by confining the answer provided to the boundaries of a belief that we are somehow separate from this knowledge. "Explain," on the other hand, simply means to make obvious what is already known and imposes none of these belief limitations.

When I sought answers concerning my colitis, I uncovered an aspective expression of myself that appeared to me as a black bird. Guidance offered this black bird and its nest-tending concerns as a metaphor. The black bird was concerned about losing its identity as a nest tender and principal family caregiver when its offspring outgrew the confines of the nest and their dependency. The nest-tender personality or aspect was, in a sense, facing death – and wasn't facing this transition comfortably.

I was unable to resolve the issues surrounding Nest Tender during this session because my bladder filled up to the point of physical discomfort and I couldn't continue with the session. This theme, however, continued for several years in many sessions.

Just two weeks later, I had the opportunity to do another PREP session. Before the session, I thought about the nest-tender aspect from my previous session. During the session, something wonderful happened. I discovered another aspect of myself that I have come to know as "the Flower." An unusual energy pattern also made itself known. It flooded my consciousness and spoke with a voice of its own while I remained in the background, mindful of all that was happening.

The nest-tender metaphor appeared as a mouse this time, and the suggestion was that Nest Tender was sleeping. I was told that offspring activity (children) and spousal influences contribute to upsetting Nest Tender. But my attention was quickly drawn away from this line of inquiry.

I began to focus on realizing (making real) an alternate aspect or personality within me, the Flower. In the days previous to this session, I had been discussing the idea of totem symbolism as a viable expression of life's patterns. During the session, this notion emerged and I began my search for an alternate aspective expression or animal totem that was appropriate.

My analytical approach was abruptly set aside and I found myself releasing the issue to Guidance, a la Florence Scovel Shinn. It was then that I discovered the Flower. Part of this wonderful discovery included experiencing a new form of communication. My thoughts and words separated, and I began to hear myself speaking in a rather unusual voice. I was fully aware of what was happening and the experience did not frighten me.

During prior sessions, I had been noticing various kinesthetic sensations, tickling, and pressure in various places, especially in my nose. The rhetoric that I heard during programs at the Institute involved the concept of controlling these kinds of vibrations or feelings. Before this booth session, I had decided that control could be identified with ego and that perhaps expressing willingness to experience these sensations might be more appropriate.

I had thought about ego being afraid of the unknown – of whatever it could not control. So, when I began to have these kinesthetic sensations during the session, I silently welcomed the feelings and the experience. I invited the tickling and the vibrations and expressed my genuine gratitude for the event. In retrospect, I think these expressions of acceptance are what led to the experience of the unusual energy voice from within.

The essence of being a flower appealed to me. This aspective expression was not based on relationships with others either by judgment or expectation. The flower reaches for the light and in so doing demonstrates to all the elegance of its beauty. The flower centers its consciousness not on its stem and roots but on the blossom, on the radiation of its beauty and in sharing that beauty with all that come to it. So, in effect, even when the plant dies, its beauty, its consciousness, lives on in the joy that it has shared.

I was reminded too that, beyond expressing the flower essence within me, I could seek out the flowerness in all around me. The session ended with a bit of knowing beyond all of this, which may have been a hint of things to come. Guidance seemed to be affirming the appropriateness of me focusing on becoming the Flower while at the same time reminding me that there is a greater expression that one might call the garden. This hint came at the end of the session and at the time I didn't fully appreciate its value.

I now think Guidance was reminding me that to perceive one's self as a sole flower reinforces the illusion of separateness. Awareness of one's identity as the whole garden realizes (makes real) our true nature. Does that make God the gardener? Or is there no separateness there either?

This whole session was capped by a very interesting experience. Without disclosing the contents of my session, I had made an audio-cassette copy of the narrative and sent the tape to Fay, my fiancee at the time, in North Carolina. Unknown to me, this beautiful woman had sent the following little story to me on the same day. Our correspondence crossed in the mail. Here's the story she sent:

“Suppose you'd known for a long time that you were a weed. When you were just a little sprout, before anyone had told you that you were a weed, you'd known something of what flowers feel like. And as you grew, you felt you'd like it better if you were a flower. But you learned to be satisfied living as a weed nonetheless – most of the time. You learned to bend a little so as not to take up too much sun, and to eat and drink and breathe not quite so much so as not to take too much nourishment from the flowers around you. It's only in spring, when the flowers start to bloom, that it's hard to be weed-like. Then, when the warm breeze comes, you feel a stirring, a hope, a wish for just a taste of blooming, but you can't of course because you're just a weed.

Now suppose that one day a lovely creature walks into your field looking for flowers. And suppose she walks straight up to you and says, 'What a strange and lovely flower is this hidden from the light!' For a moment you would not believe her. But oh, you would want to. So you might begin softly to look and feel around yourself. And what if you discovered that this had all been a silly mistake – that you were not a weed, but a flower after all.

Well, that's what it feels like. A little sad that I spent so much time as a weed when I didn't have to. A little in shock. A little exposed. Excited, in a quiet way, to discover what I'm all about. I don't know much about being a flower, yet. But it's me, and I love it, and I'm giving it all I've got.”

Author Unknown

The story was accompanied by a drawing of a flower looking at a reflection of itself as a weed, not realizing its true nature because of the image of itself that it saw. It reminded me of an anorexic looking into a mirror and not seeing a thin person.

After we received our respective mailings, Fay and I were astonished by the serendipity. It brought us closer together (as if we were ever really separate in the first place). I thought long and hard about this session and the circumstances surrounding it. Even today, Fay and I speak fondly of the memories it has left with us.

A month later, I did another PREP session that turned out to be a major breakthrough. I discussed my intent for this next session, as I had done for the previous work. I wanted to ask Guidance about Fay, to explain this new and wondrous relationship with me.

I had met Fay when she came to the Institute on a Saturday morning for a prearranged tour of the facilities. The minute I saw her, I thought I recognized her. As the tour progressed, we wound up in the lab. Fay and I were standing in the doorway of the isolation booth while I explained the soundproofing, the flotation bed, and the physiological monitoring. I gradually became aware of the rest of the world fading away. Within just a few seconds, Fay and I were seemingly alone.

Although my mouth kept spewing out the construction details and technical attributes of the booth, I was alert to the fact that things were not at all as they seemed. As Dorothy said in The Wizard of Oz, "I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore." This strange place we fell into seemed to extend beyond all space and time. It was truly the proverbial forever. Just as gently as it had come over us, it was gone. We looked at each other and, without speaking, joined the others on the Institute tour.

The next significant activity that day was lunch. We ordered takeout and got some croissant sandwiches with dill-flavored potato salad from the Blue Ridge Pig, a local rustic cafe in Nellysford. Several Institute staff members and those taking the tour sat around the lunch table, socializing and getting to know one another. Fay started talking about moving out to Seattle to work for Lou Tice and his Investment in Excellence program. It seemed to me from her enthusiasm that this move was inevitable.

I couldn't take my eyes off her. She was so beautiful. I longed for the taste of her lips on mine. Unexpectedly, I heard myself thinking, "Why are you leaving me now that I have found you, after so long?" Fay looked at me and blushed with embarrassment, then looked away. She must have heard my thoughts.

After lunch, I asked my fellow staff members at the Institute if I had said anything unusual at lunch. They reported that I had not. Fortunately, Fay canceled her plans to move to Seattle, and our relationship quickly blossomed. But I still wanted to ask Guidance about Fay. Who was she? What was the overpowering attraction? It was something greater, deeper, and more profound than sex. What could it be?

I also wanted to understand more about this unusual energy voice that spoke the truth from somewhere inside my heart. The energy-voice experience had touched me deeply. It was intensely personal. I felt as though I was exposing myself, the true me without any social masks behind which I could safely hide. I thought about using affirmations of willingness to encourage more contact with the energy voice and my bride-to-be, Fay, with whom I shared these adventures, was perhaps finding out more about me than she had imagined.

In answer to my questions about Fay, I found myself in what appeared to be a bedroom scene. At the time, I thought this was too silly and too filled with sexual innuendo to be real. But then I was shown a heart-shaped pillow and told that this symbolized Fay as the epitome of the expression "a heart of gold." (Later, during a visit to Fay's house in North Carolina, I was intrigued to find out that she indeed had a heart-shaped pillow with white lace on her bed.)

I consider this session a breakthrough because of the intensity of the experience with the energy voice. The experience was very physical. I experienced the unconditional love of my total self. I found out more about the flower aspect, the garden, and tending the garden. And I discovered that asking to understand is a rather narrow concept.

Guidance told me not to limit myself (by asking to understand) but to express my willingness to experience love – in so doing I will come to know All That Is. What is valuable is experience, and Fay with her heart of gold was to be just such an experience.

My exploration of reality through personal experience continues today. I enjoy attending the Institute programs and occasionally doing a PREP session in the booth in the lab.

Through life's process, I have realized the rhetoric of my childhood. We are never separate from spirit. Things are not physical or spiritual. We are, always. We sometimes have physical experiences. I realize, therefore, it is not especially necessary to enter a focus-level state to commune with my spiritual self. I am that being and all it takes is a simple shift in perspective to access all that I AM.

My ventures have helped answer some of those persistent questions that were originally presented in the Gateway Voyage program. Who am I? Where and who was I before I entered this physical being? What is my purpose for this existence in physical-matter reality? What action can I now take to best serve this purpose? What is the content of the most important message that I can receive and understand at this point in my existence?

Right now the answers seem to be:

From there I experienced Focus 24, 25, and 26 – the Belief System territories where those who have exited the physical are residing in a particular belief system. I then went on to Focus 27 – the Reception Center, Way Station, or Park, representing a process designed to ease the trauma and shock of the transition out of physical reality and assist in evaluating options for the next steps in growth and development.

I became familiar with these levels and then offered assistance to those I met in these realms. I also helped those I met come to know they survived physical death by inviting them to accompany me to Focus 27. Some call these activities rescues.

During several of the exercises, I kept passing by a guy in Focus 25 who seemed to be repairing a sink drain. After seeing him on a few exercises, I finally stopped and asked him what he was doing. He said that he had to get the sink fixed because there was an electrical short and somebody might get hurt. I wondered if a rescue was in order.

I asked him if he wanted to take a break and come with me for a while. He said he would, and I moved off toward my favorite place in Focus 27. He followed, and when we arrived he began looking around the kitchen and noticed that, although there was illumination, there were no light fixtures or light switches. I asked him what he thought about that and if he liked the idea. He said he thought it was just fine and began to relax a bit.

A. J. Honeycutt, Bob Monroe's stepson and, at one time Vice President of Operations here at The Monroe Institute, was a stalwart example of thirty-something (at the time) manhood, and was one of my fellow participants in the second Exploration 27 program I attended. Beneath his sculptured physique and brusque mannerisms, A.J. hid a depth of understanding. You could see it in his eyes. He had his mother's eyes, the eyes of Nancy Penn Monroe.

During the program, in the state of consciousness called Focus 27, A. J. visited a nonphysical version of the Roberts Mountain Retreat. He began looking around and found familiar articles, pictures, and knickknacks in all their proper places. In what he perceived as the kitchen area, he started thinking about small repairs that were necessary. To his astonishment, he found that this nonphysical version of the Roberts Mountain Retreat needed no repairs.

A.J. explained all this to us in the conference room after his experience. It illustrates that these nonphysical realms are not objective realities but convenient projections of our own idealized
expectations. It is probably more practical not to think about places in nonphysical realms but rather processes.

In Focus 27, the Roberts Mountain Retreat process might include methods and practices for experiencing aspects of All That Is beyond the Earth-life system. We overlay these experiences on
mental projections of physical matter reality in an attempt (many times unsuccessfully) to mentally integrate meaningfulness.

I also explored beyond Focus 27, into previously uncharted territories referred to as Focus 34/35. At this level it is nearly impossible to relate experiences in human terms. Metaphorically, I found myself inside a great oneness, which appeared to me as a crystal geode. The message here was that just as the geode is one thing made up of many individual crystalline forms which are dependent on each other to create the unity of the geode form, so too is humanity one thing made up of each of us and by which humanity itself is defined.