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CENTER FOR SELF-CHANGE INFO NOTES
Short essays on change by J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.

CURRENT ISSUE

Changing - Part II: The Butterfly Breakout

RECENT ISSUES

Changing - Part I: The Comfortable Chair

Shouldn't We Be More Like the Elephants?

"Wrestling with Hypnosis"

"What the Cougar's Tail Can Tell Us"

"Predicting Your Future"

"Teacups, Doorways, Highways, and You"

"The Wisdom of the Ignorant"

"The Ravens, The Wolves, and the Rest of Us"

"The Good Life in La Plata 4500 Years Ago"

"The Real Ghosts"

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CHANGING - PART II: THE BUTTERFLY BREAKOUT
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April 19, 2005

This is the second essay in a three-part series on changing.

I am focusing on changing in order to emphasize the role which action plays in the change process.

That is exemplified in the remarkable transformations which a butterfly undergoes on its way to fulfilling its nature. It is an ancient example to which many have referred in the past because it is so compelling.

The butterfly, which will later flit and fly in joyous beauty, begins its life as a lowly, crawling creature - the caterpillar.

At some point it heeds a call to wrap itself in a cocoon of its own making - and then, it seems, to sleep.

This must all be done at the right time. If it acts too soon or too late, the conditions won't be right.

Existence will not support its untimely activity and the caterpillar will die on the ground never having been transformed, never having flown.

While it sleeps, its renewal begins. Within its cocoon, the caterpillar is transformed into a chrysalis. This part of the change process is not of its own doing - no caterpillar becomes a chrysalis on its own initiative.

It surrenders initiative and submits itself to its fate in order to have a chance to fulfill its destiny.

Its fate is to be transformed.

Its destiny is to fly.

At some point (again when the time is right) a new form begins to emerge from the cocoon. It must struggle to do so. Coming into its new existence is not easy. It must devote all of its strength and attention to breaking out and leaving behind where it has been and what it once was.

This is a time when successful change requires the full effort of changing. There can be no sleeping now.

The self-change involved is the butterfly's own work - without which it will die.

No one can help.

To interfere with this process by trying to make it easier will kill the new being. It will not be able to gain the strength through struggle that it must have to survive.

Once it succeeds, it needs to rest undisturbed for a time before it is dry enough and strong enough to soar away to its new life as a beautiful butterfly.

And when it flies it does so, once again, on its own. No one can do that for it, either.

It is no surprise then that the butterfly is the classical Greek image of the soul.

We human beings are subject to change - and we also have hope for transformation.

For both butterflies and people, timeliness lies at the heart of successful change.

Like the butterfly we must respond receptively when the time is right to allow ourselves to be transformed. And we must act with unreserved determination when the time is right for active self-change.

To miss the time is to miss the chance to change well.

It is our fate to undergo change.

It is our destiny to become transformed - thus fully becoming our highest selves.

So, when it is time to leave behind what you have been in order to have a chance at being what you can become, give it all you've got.

Make a butterfly breakout. Be willing to struggle and survive.

We must actively play our own required role in changing if we are ever to move from just crawling along to flying through life with new wings of beauty.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>.

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Changing - Part I: The Comfortable Chair
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April 13, 2005

Can you remember a time when you sat for a while in a really comfortable chair?

Can you imagine the pleasure of sitting in one now? What would it be like to take some time out right now to enjoy a chair like that? What would it be like if you could spend half an hour in it - or an hour?

My hypnosis clients really love that, by the way. It offers them a time of deep rest in which to do the inner work needed for right action in daily life.

But what if you were in any chair, no matter how comfortable, for ten hours? Ten days? Ten years? What about a hundred years? [1]

That's impossible. So we obviously need more than comfort. We need change, too. In fact we need to be actively open to changing - so that we can keep on changing as needed.

But most people find changing uncomfortable. They move one or two steps away from pain or disappointment in life, then stop. They take half-measures, rather than really changing things by changing themselves instead.

But life doesn't really give us time for half-measures.

We are time beings. Each life is a walk through time. Each of us is on a journey, moving from one situation in time to another. And life itself will change us over time no matter what we do. That's why the American poet Delmore Schwartz wrote:

"Time is the fire in which we burn." [2]

So trying to stay too long in some "comfort zone" always ends in loss and failure.

The answer lies in the activity of timely changing through self-change.

Self-change begins with listening more to our own inner spiritual self than to our psychologically conditioned emotions. It is absolutely vital for living a life that is truly alive.

Trying to avoid self-change is like sitting too long in the comfortable chair. The chair becomes a trap. Our lives become static - and thus lifeless.

Listening and responding to the wisdom of the inner self, however, frees us to be always ready to go from one comfortable chair to the next, enjoying each in its own time and place - and moving on when the time for changing has come again.

It takes courage. But anyone can do it. And we really haven't time for anything less.

So, if it is time again for change in your life, let today be the day. Get some directions from your inner self and start changing now.

You might even want to try the hypnosis chair. It really is a very comfortable place for doing that from time to time.

And it has a secret: It never asks you to stay too long - because the deep rest it provides is always directed toward rapid, successful change.

[1] This image of the comfortable chair is borrowed from
"Buddhism, Footprint of the Buddha -- India," episode 3 of
The Long Search, BBC-TV video recording, produced
by Peter Montagnon, narrated by Ronald Eyre (New York:
Time-Life Video, 1977).

[2] Delmore Schwartz (1913-1966), "Calmly We Walk
Through This April's Day," Selected Poems: Summer
Knowledge, ch. 2, The Repetitive Heart: Poems in Imita-
tion of the Fugue (New York: W. W. Norton, 1967), 66-67.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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SHOULDN'T WE BE MORE LIKE THE ELEPHANTS?
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March 29, 2005

On the 24th of December, 2004 the Mollucan archipelago which forms part of Indonesia was devastated by what many there have called the "Christmas Tsunami."

That's interesting in a way because, while many Mollucans are Christians, many more are Muslims - and the two groups have been at war with each other for quite a while.

Both groups nevertheless share a common culture with myths and traditions much older than the influence of either religion. Their common stories, songs, and dances tell of events far back in time. Many of these stories are about the sea, for the Mollucans spend more time on their boats, fishing and living in coastal waters, than they ever do on land.

The knowledge preserved in one of those ancient tales saved the members of one Mollucan community from the death waves that came just four months ago.

That's because an old man noticed the waters receding strangely from the shore and warned his family, who warned the rest of the community.

They had remembered the songs and dances that told of this phenomenon. They therefore knew what was to come - and what to do about it. No one in their group died in the tidal waves that day. Their shared cultural memory saved them.

This caused me to remember something, too.

Apparently no elephants died, either.

Until just recently, we didn't believe that elephants could communicate with one another except by trumpeting. Now researchers have proven that they send and receive information through low-frequency rumblings. We humans cannot hear them without special equipment but the elephants can communicate with one another in that way over very long distances. It's sort of like whale talk, except that whales use high-pitched tones.

So I began to wonder, do elephants have a way to share traditional knowledge handed down from their ancestors?

We know they visit so-called elephant graveyards and spend time with the bones of their dead - and not just when the death has been recent. They seem to know something about grief and mourning, and missing those close to them.

And we know they all pretty much took to the hills well before the Christmas Tsunami struck. They trumpeted warnings and headed for high ground.

Was that because they, like the Mollucans, had a story about that? Did they share some particular rumblings with one another?

Or did they just hear the rumblings of the ocean and move away from danger for that reason?

In any case, it seems to me that we could all learn from that example.

There are signs we should all attend to in our family and business lives - signs about things that have come and gone before many times in the past.

They are preserved in what Native Americans call the wisdom of the grandfathers.

We should become more familiar (family-er) with them. They tell us what happens when people, like the ocean, behave in ways that endanger us all - when they abuse one another, or cheat on their spouses, or fail to live up to their responsibilities as parents and partners and extended family members in other ways.

Every family has such stories.

Corporate "families" have stories, too.

They are preserved in the "institutional memory" of each organization and handed down from one managerial generation to another.

Let us hope that the present generation of business executives adds to the corporate wisdom of the grandfathers by sharing the warning signs of greed and wrongdoing that foretell disaster to come.

Let them memorialize the tsunamis that were Enron, and Worldcom, and the savings and loan scandals.

Shouldn't we be more like the Mollucans? They saw the signs, remembered the stories, shared the warnings, and saved one another.

Shouldn't we at least be more like the elephants?

If nothing else, they responded naturally to the danger signs. They took action when they knew something wasn't right.

When they heard the rumblings, they trumpeted the alarm, and moved quickly out of harm's way together.

Elephants, you know, have big ears to listen with - and they can trumpet very loudly.

We should all be listening within our corporate and family cultures for the sounds of danger. And we should speak up about them right away - and as loudly as necessary.

That way we can avoid (and even prevent) disasters before they overwhelm us.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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WRESTLING WITH HYPNOSIS
-------------------------------------------

The Valhalla High School* wrestling team recently won the CIF** Div. III
championships, despite being underdogs due to deep cuts in its roster.
Last year the Norsemen lost many of their varsity wrestlers to a district
split and this year other forms of attrition thinned the ranks of
experienced competitors even more.

But they had one remarkable advantage their rivals knew nothing about:
hypnosis!

Last year, at the request of Valhalla's head wrestling coach, Glen
Takahashi, I designed and presented a series of training classes based on
the Sports Hypnosis Clinic I previously taught for the San Diego State
University athletics department.

The training combined hypnosis and self-hypnosis for goal achievement and
self-confidence. important gains were made last year and the program was
continued into 2005.

So by CIF time this season, many of the Valhalla boys were using powerful
techniques of sports hypnosis to offset the odds against them - and in the
end, several of the sports hypnosis wrestlers helped take the team to Div.
III victory.

Coach Takahashi was very positive about the results and told his wrestlers
the team could have gone much farther if more of them had taken advantage
of the training.

A good number of the sports hypnosis participants have also reported
improvement in their studies.

Of course, my past experience leads me to believe the benefits go beyond
sports achievement and academic improvement.

*Valhalla High is located in El Cajon, CA.

**The California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) is the state governing
body for high school sports competition.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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WHAT THE COUGAR'S TAIL CAN TELL US
------------------------------------------------------------

February 8, 2005

This selection was reprinted in the training section of "The Sycuan Voice," Employee Bulletin of the Sycuan Casino and Resort Corporation, March, 2005, p. 2.

As a cougar follows his prey, he stops when the prey stops; lies down when it does; and moves when it moves again.

He can be very patient about all of this - except for his tail.

It often curls one way and then the other, thrashing from side to side while he waits, leaving "tell-tail" marks on the ground.

Thrash-thrash. Thrash-thrash. Back and forth. Side to side. It looks just like the "couch cougar" (kitty cat) you may have at home.

At some point, however, the cougar has to make a decision: either to attack or give up the hunt. And then he leaves a very different mark on the ground.

Whichever choice he makes, once he has made it, he straightens his tail and slaps it down hard on the ground - right at the center line between his thrash marks. And at that very instant the cougar springs into immediate action.

What might this image from nature tell us about our own decision making?

Well, we might speculate that, having "considered both sides" of his situation, the cougar always chooses the middle ground and so should we. After all, there is a great deal of philosophical wisdom behind choosing what is called the Middle Way or the Golden Mean - the path between two extremes.

The problem with that idea is that it can too easily turn into compromise for the sake of compromise - a habitual attitude of indecisive fence-straddling. The wisdom of the Golden Mean must always be embodied in a timely way. Trying to be moderate at the wrong time will lead us not to the middle but to a muddle instead.

And that's not what the cougar's tail shows us here anyway.

It's not about the middle - but the center.

Or more specifically, not the middle path but the center point.

The cougar has made a choice to attack or go home. Either way he now has to make a decisive move that settles the matter.

His tail comes down in the center because that's where his balance point is. (And who knows more about balance than a cat?)

It is true, of course, that whenever we have an important choice to make we should (if it is timely) consider both sides and (if it is timely) we will do well to follow the middle way - although there are times when we have to take an instantaneous stand on one side or the other.

Nonetheless, the most important thing is that right action always comes from our own center - that inner place where all of our physical, moral, psychological, and spiritual energies reside together in balance and harmony.

We know that makes sense because it's when we're most out of balance that we make our worst mistakes.

So I think this is what the cougar's tail can tell us:

Once we make a choice, we should get ourselves truly centered and balanced - and then take immediate, decisive action.

That will always give us the best chance for success in anything we do.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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PREDICTING YOUR FUTURE
-----------------------------------------

February 1, 2005

In 1955 how could anyone anywhere in the entire world have predicted that within just 50 years an African-American woman would be our secretary of state?

Or that we would have a Chinese-American deputy secretary of defense named David Chu?

For that matter, how could anyone have predicted that a southern-born black woman like Condoleeza Rice would be able to earn a Ph.D. in political science and become a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences?

Or even that she might be respectfully referred to as "black" or "African-American"? After all, they used different words in those days, didn't they?

Who could have foreseen that as the National Security Council's senior director for soviet affairs she would help bring freedom to Poland and contribute to the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of communism throughout the world?

Or that her immediate predecessor as secretary of state would be a black man from Jamaica who was previously chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, responsible for overseeing all the armed forces of the United States of America?

Or that many people in this country would be happy if Colin L. Powell himself were our president?

Or, perhaps most astonishing in 1955, that a fundamentalist Christian president from Texas would be the man to choose both Powell and Rice to administer the foreign policy of the United States?

No one could have predicted any of these things fifty years ago.

But they all came about — because enough people pursued right action sincerely enough, seriously enough, and long enough that our world was changed.

Right action is the doing of the right thing, in the right way, at the right time, for the right reason.

It is whatever remains to be done once you take all selfish desire out of the decision process.

What has all this got to do with predicting your future?

It's simple: If right action is not already your operating principle, you can choose it now.

Just stick to right action and your future will be as unpredictably amazing as our nation's was in 1955. Despite mistakes and setbacks — and with much work yet to be done — the United States still continues to move forward in many truly positive ways.

Through consistent right action over time, we can all find our own personal worlds changing as well.

And the changes will occur in wonderful ways, with remarkable outcomes for ourselves and others which we can't even dream of today.

That's a prediction you can count on.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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TEACUPS, DOORWAYS, HIGHWAYS, AND YOU
-------------------------------------------------------------------

January 25, 2005

What is it about teacups and doorways that makes them so useful?

It's the same thing in both cases — and you use it every time you drive your car.

It is emptiness. The emptiness in a teacup allows it to be filled. A filled up doorway cannot be used, but an empty one lets us go from inside to outside and from room to room.

The empty space is critical.

What's that got to do with highways?

It's the most important thing, actually.

We have to pay attention to the empty spaces between cars whenever we change lanes.

So whether you think about it or not, you use the principle of empty space all the time.

Now here's a way to use that same principle when dealing with people.

Look for empty spaces in their arguments when they don't agree with your ideas. That way you won't collide with their thinking. You can just move into an area they have not yet occupied — and then you are both lined up together, going in the same direction.

Here's an example:

MANAGER: I don't think we should take on the Spurling-Edwards account right now.

DEPT. HEAD: It looks good to me. I put some effort into getting it. What's the problem?

MANAGER: We don't have anyone familiar enough with their system to do the job really well.

DEPT. HEAD: Is that all we have to worry about? Anything else?

MANAGER: No. That's all, but it's very important. I don't want to buy problems. And I don't have the time or the budget to train people for just that account.

DEPT. HEAD: I thought Kathy's team could catch on quickly, but I can see what you mean. Still, its a big account. It could be very profitable. Let me make a phone call and get back to you.

(LATER)

MANAGER: What have you got?

DEPT. HEAD: Spurling-Edwards said they would train our people for us if we would go ahead. But if they do that they'll want to extend the initial contract agreement by 18 months.

MANAGER: That's great. We can do that.

The department head was able to get the account by moving into an open space in the manager's viewpoint — instead of colliding with an opinion that was already formed.

Remember to use the empty spaces.

It's always a good idea whenever you have a cup of tea or coffee...

...walk through a door...

...drive your car...

or need to find a solution.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

------------------------------------------------
THE WISDOM OF THE IGNORANT
------------------------------------------------

December 21, 2004

If you were in school in Egypt some 5000 years ago, your copy book would have been The Instructions of Ptah-Hotep.

Said to be the oldest surviving book in the world, it was written between 3000 and 2500 BC by the Grand Vizier of Pharaoh Isesi as a text on practical conversation for members of the royal court. A copy of it is preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris.

Here is one of the most important things Ptah-Hotep had to say:

"Take counsel with the ignorant as with the wise." *

That's really great advice for anyone working with others today — because they're not really as ignorant as we may sometimes think.

Whether we are in organizational management or managing a family, we can develop a tendency to assume that we know what needs to be done and how to do it. Others don't know (or don't know enough) and should listen to us.

But things are constantly changing far too rapidly for that to be a very good idea today.

We need to use all of our available resources to make the right changes ... in the right way ... at the right time ... as quickly as possible — so that problems disappear.

Fortunately, we now have a new change management tool to make that happen.

And it's one that works as well at home as it does in business.

It's called Solution Focused Change.

Solution Focused Change is a perfect fit for our current turbulent times.

It has one basic principle: It is better to focus on the quick discovery of solutions than to get stuck working on problems.

Emphasizing problems often leads to blaming, factions, and more problems.

Solution Focused Change, however, generates broader participation and more useful contributions from all involved. It brings people together in discovering solutions which create change.

I believe that is very important, since so many things seem to drive people apart these days.

When solution-focused managers or parents ask the people experiencing (and/or creating) the problem to become "solution detectives," they all pitch in and start working together. This mutual focus on solutions makes it is easy to get real change in place rapidly — with maximum effect and minimum effort.

After all, who really knows more about a problem and its possible solutions than the people who are right in the midst of it?

They may not even think they have solutions in the beginning. But with the right encouragement, you'd be surprised at how rapidly their "ignorance" turns into creativity based on experience. Often someone will recall something that worked for a completely different problem in a different area — and, with just a little variation, that becomes a solution to the one facing you now.

Here are some basic steps to get you started with Solution Focused Change:

1) Don't focus on the problem. Look for *exceptions* to it (times and places where it doesn't occur).

2) Expand on those exceptions. Make them happen more and more often. That way the problem becomes the exception to the new reality and eventually drops away altogether.

3) Count on those involved in or affected by the problem to find solutions based on past experiences that you may know nothing about — or on insights that come to them when "brainstorming" as a team.

4) Put promising solutions to work right away. Getting something started is better than getting it perfect. Solutions can be refined and improved once they are underway.

5) Keep it up. Don't stop with just one success. Use the principles of Solution Focused Change again and again as new things come up.

Once you start using this approach, you can get very good at it very quickly.

For more solution information, visit this url:
<http://www.self-change.com/training.htm>

Be sure to click on "The Solution-Focused Approach" while you're there.

* Ptah Hotep, Instructions of Ptah Hotep in The Ancient Egyptians: A Sourcebook of Their Writings, ed. Adolf Erman, trans. Aylward M. Blackman with an introduction by William K. Simpson (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), 56.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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THE RAVENS, THE WOLVES, AND THE REST OF US
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December 14, 2004

Here's a book anyone can enjoy for Christmas.

It's exciting, entertaining, and has some great lessons, as well.

Helen Thayer, Three Among the Wolves: A Couple and Their Dog Live a Year With Wolves in the Wild (Seattle: Sasquatch Books, 2004).

Almost nothing can be more frightening to human beings than a howling pack of wolves just yards away.

But by allowing their wolf-Husky pet, Charlie, to act as the "alpha male" of their personal "pack," Helen and Bill Thayer were able to live within 100 feet of a wolf den for a whole year in complete safety — and even friendship!

Charlie's presence, and their carefully planned "subordination" to him, allowed the Thayers to be accepted as a part of a neighboring pack rather than as a human threat.

There were certain rules the group had to follow in order to be successful.

Charlie could eat meat but the couple stuck to a vegetarian diet, offering the wolf family (five adults, two adolescents, and two young pups) no competition for food.

And when accompanying the wolves on hunting expeditions in the Yukon and Arctic, Bill and Helen followed Charlie's lead. He was the boss and they did things his way. Charlie had been raised by native Inuits and still had much of his wolf nature intact. He was so wise in the ways of the wolf, in fact, that another pack tried to recruit him as a member — but he stayed with his human family.

The Thayer's had many wonderful learning experiences during their year with the wolves.

For one thing, they were able to see the much-talked about cooperation between wolves and ravens on the hunt. The ravens act as "eyes in the sky" for the wolves, leading them to prey, and sharing the feast after a kill is made. They also sound the alarm for danger. And if a wolf is injured they can lead pack members to him or her.

Wolves take good care of sick and wounded pack mates, bringing food to them, keeping them company, and playing in ways that keep their spirits up while they heal.

Ravens have also been known to help humans hunt — if they are left a share as their reward. And they have guided people to injured humans, too. But they cooperate in these ways only with humans "who respect them" according to the Inuits (p. 56).

And indeed a large part of what we can get from this book has to do with lessons in mutual respect — and attention to styles of communication.

Wolves and ravens do not speak the same language — but they can understand each other.

They have different cultures — yet they can work well together.

And, just as with humans, it seems that each wolf and raven has a distinctive personality — which must be taken into account during any group interaction.

In that regard this book offers some sterling insights for those
interested in creating change.

If you wish to have real influence with people then:

1) Learn to communicate in ways they can understand — and about things that have meaning for them;

2) Respect their ways whenever possible so that they can more easily accept you and hear what you have to say;

3) Give them a fair share of the rewards that come from working together;

4) Let them know that you will be loyal to them and will be there when they need help;

5) Show as much sincere appreciation for each person's individuality as the situation will permit;

6) And remember Charlie. Use a go-between, an experienced coworker or family member — or perhaps a good counselor or consultant — to make things easier in the beginning.

These principles are part of our natural heritage as participants in the mystery and the oneness of life.

They work just as well — and are just as important — in the work place and at home as in the wild.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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THE GOOD LIFE IN LA PLATA 4500 YEARS AGO
------------------------------------------------------------------

December 3, 2004

What were you doing 4500 years ago?

Well, if you were living in the La Plata Basin of what is now Uruguay, you were living well — and taking time to smell the flowers!

It has long been thought that people in this area lived only in isolated groups of primitive hunter-gatherers.

But recent excavations at Los Ajos have changed all that.

Archaeologists have discovered sophisticated levels of engineering, planning, and cooperation. That includes an independent architectural tradition previously unknown to this part of southern South America. So far seven imposing platform mounds surrounding a central plaza area have been unearthed. And in the ten square kilometers surrounding Los Ajos there are ten other large and spatially complex mound sites waiting to be explored, as well.

Far from living in primitive subsistence groups, the inhabitants of these sites were actually members of a social order made up of interrelated towns and villages connected by long trails.

Fossil remains show that their farming success was so abundant that they had time to grow and enjoy varieties of decorative and fragrant flowers as well as several staple food crops.

There are no records to tell us what was on their minds as they raised their children, dealt with in-laws, experienced mood swings, and had differences of opinion with their spouses and neighbors.

We can be pretty sure, nonetheless, that they had many of the same personal concerns we face today, despite important cultural differences.

Did you know that farther north, in Mexico, the later Aztecs had secular counselors who worked outside (though not against) the religious framework of their society? People were able to go to them for help with their daily problems.

I wonder if we will ever discover that the La Platans of Los Ajos had similar opportunities.

It is very likely they did, considering that so many cultures across all times have had counselors of one kind or another.

Not only is counseling one of the flowers of culture which contribute to the good life, it is also a valuable staple of growth, self-understanding, and positive change.

As I look ahead to my 35th year as a counselor, I realize how much I still love my job. And I think I would have been as happy doing it 4500 years ago as I am today.

I prefer being here now, of course.

For one thing, I really enjoy our modern connectivity, including email.

And I truly appreciate being able to provide people across the country and around the world with the services they want — while they are comfortably "At Home by Phone."

Hiking long trails and climbing platform mounds ... that's for vacations, right?

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

----------------------------
THE REAL GHOSTS
----------------------------

October 31, 2004

Modern investigative technology is amazing.

Here's an example. We are now able to enter into rooms long after people have left them and, using high-tech scanning devices, produce "ghost" images of who was sitting where and how they may have walked about the room — by reading the heat signatures they left behind.

This supports to some extent that idea that past events can leave "impressions" which some people are able to perceive years later.

Maybe that explains the following story from York, England.

It gives us something to think about this Halloween, as little ghosts appear on our doorsteps.

Harry Martindale, is a retired police officer who was 18 years old in 1953. He was young and naturally had no particular expertise in Roman history. Yet one day that year he saw a cohort of Roman legionnaires march past him so clearly that the accuracy of his descriptions of them, their uniforms, and equipment greatly impressed many scholars and historians at the time.

He was working alone in a cellar room at the Treasurer's House in York when it happened. That is a medieval building adjoining the city's cathedral. The event began when he heard a horn of some kind which at first he thought must have come from the church.

But then, as he looked across the room, he saw about 20 Roman legionnaires on foot and another on horseback march out of a wall and across the basement before disappearing again into solid stone at the other side.

During this year's York Ghost Festival leading up to All Hallows Eve, he told his story once again — for the first time in many years.

"They were human beings," he said. "They were as real as you and me standing here." Admitting that he had no idea why he was able to see them, he stated nonetheless that "there is no doubt in my mind what I saw."

Some years after Martindale's "vision," excavations in the cellar revealed it was on the direct route of an old Roman road leading to a military garrison.

If Martindale's story is true then the horn he heard would have been a signal alerting the watch at the garrison gate that the cohort was about to arrive.

Perhaps young Harry saw real Roman ghosts, still going about their business in this world for some reason unknown to us.

Or perhaps he was simply able to perceive the "signature" they left behind in their march to the garrison.

I don't know. I don't know Harry Martindale and I can't say how true his tale may (or may not) really be.

As a therapist, however, I do know that many of us have similar experiences every day — only differently.

We all have been affected by the "signatures" others have left in our lives. We all have what could be called "ghost images" of events from the past. These are the real ghosts of Halloween — and everyday life.

It is always good to see them as clearly as possible and to be able to describe them as objectively as Harry Martindale described his Roman legionnaires.

Harry's ghosts never returned.

Ours can be put to rest as well.

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.
<www.self-change.com>

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