Elvis Has Entered the Building

I found the craziest podcast. Regular readers know that I’m interested in paranormal stuff, UFO stuff, near death experiences, religion, metaphysics, blah blah blah (and, I’ll be honest, I’m not even entirely sure what “metaphysics” means but I know it’s a subject in which I’m interested). Spotify has become attuned to my listening habits and offered me a podcast suggestion entitled “Hacking the Afterlife,” in which a former entertainment reporter and a professional psychic medium talk to dead celebrities. Last week’s episode featured conversations with Elvis, Junior Seau, Anthony Bourdain, and Aretha Franklin. No doubt, this sounds absurd. Even as I write the words it sounds absurd. And yet… I’m not saying I believe it, but what I am saying is that Elvis gives some pretty good advice.

Also, their third co-host died in 1996.

The woman at the center of this show is named Jennifer Shaffer. According to her LinkedIn page, Jennifer is “a psychic investigator and profiler” who works with federal and law enforcement to “help resolution for these families.” Her gift arose in childhood after being administered belladonna to treat seizures. She says the plant created “an opening,” which allows her to communicate with those who have died. “I see both worlds at once,” she says.

Her co-host is Richard Matini, who has been studying the “flipside” for decades. He met Jennifer when she reached out to him after reading his book, It’s a Wonderful Afterlife. During their initial three-hour meeting, they solved the Amelia Earhart mystery.

According to Richard’s account:

“As we got to the end of our session, he asked ‘Well, what happened to your body?’ And Jennifer took out a pen and drew a map of a location on Saipan - an island Martini had just returned from. She drew an accurate map and pinpointed accurate places on the island he’d just visited. He then asked, “So how did she die?”… Jennifer listened for a moment and said, ‘She died of dysentery.’ Then after a pause, she said, ‘And those two GI’s who dug up my body, they only found an arm.’”

After that auspicious beginning, the two began collaborating on their podcast, a freewheeling conversation between themselves and their third co-host, Luana Anders, an actress of little renown who had small roles in numerous TV and film projects until her death in 1996.

Luana Anders

The conversations with celebrities typically take two tracks. The first is general advice related to matters at hand. In the most recent episode, Jennifer talked about finding “contraband” in her son’s bedroom, by which seems to have meant cigarettes. This led to a conversation about addiction, which led to Elvis “coming forward” to talk about the pain his own addictions caused his loved ones. Then, former San Diego Charger Junior Seau compared addiction to CTE, from which he suffered and which caused him to take his own life, saying that the two diagnoses are obviously different but have overlap. Further, he says they can both be treated through hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Good to know.

Now, obviously, nothing said, in any way qualifies as “proof” that what’s being communicated is being communicated by spirits. Junior also said that Joe Namath “cured” his own CTE using the same method, which, as it turns out, is true. Did Jennifer know that before beginning the episode? I don’t know. Occam’s Razor suggests that she must have. That being said, in the past, Shaffer also had a conversation with Seau’s widow, Gina, correctly identifying several objects Gina had put in her purse without Martini or Shaffer’s knowledge, but which held special meaning for her and her late husband.

The other track these conversations often take are questions posed by Martini, in which he asks his guests who greeted them when they crossed over to the other side.

“Rock Hudson,” said Tony Bennett.

Gary Wright, who wrote the song “Dreamweaver,” had Alzheimer’s for the final years of his life. He told Jennifer that having Alzheimer’s allowed him to live in both dimensions at once before he crossed over to be greeted by his mother.

They’ve also got a nutty Aretha Franklin story:

When Aretha crossed over, Jennifer Shaffer and I interviewed her. Jennifer didn’t know that “there was no will” — but when I asked her about it “why didn’t you leave a will?” Aretha insisted “I did leave a will. Ask my niece about it, she’ll find it… So I looked up Aretha’s family and discovered her niece IS the executor of Aretha’s estate. I wrote to her, apologized for doing so, told her the circumstances of the “conversation” with her aunt, and left it up to her whether to forward her the transcript. Aretha’s will somewhere in her house” — which she later did find in her couch.

It would be (and maybe should be) easy to dismiss this psychic crap as so much wishful thinking. So why do so many people believe it? According to a new Pew Research study, 53% of Americans “have ever felt that a family member who is dead has visited them in a dream or some other form” and 15% “had dead family members communicate with them.” That’s a lot of people talking to the dead.

What do you think? Is communication with “The Flipside” possible? Do some people have natural gifts as mediums? Can those gifts be developed? What does it mean for us here if we continue on over there? All of it feels vague and unsettling to me and I don’t know what to make of it so I’ll give the final words to Elvis, who advises us all to “not be afraid to play differently, play different notes.”

Fair enough. So that’s what I’m doing. I’ll keep playing different notes and hope that, one day, some kind of tune comes out that makes some kind of sense. Because the more I learn about this world, the less sense it makes. Play on, Elvis, play on.