Among the myriad manners in which our deceased beloveds may visit us are a few we might be frightened by—especially if we’ve seen one too many poltergeist flicks. Or we could be just left saying, “No way, Jose,” totally confounded. These visitations involve electrical and physical manifestations.

Blenders go on in the middle of the night. Alarm systems may suddenly malfunction. Televisions change channels while they’re off or turn on when no one is around. Lights flash. Unexamined, these may simply seem strange, as well as unrelated to the dead. If experts are called in and no problems are discovered, we may be told, “It’s just a fluke, ma’am.”

However, if we turn our attention to these phenomena, hidden meaning may surface. For instance, a Canadian woman I interviewed felt, at once, when her home’s alarm system went off for no obvious reason, that this might be her recently-deceased mother’s doing. She had the system checked out—nothing was wrong, she was told, but the system continued to malfunction. Next time she was told that, “A big truck must have gone by.” By digging a little deeper she found significance in the timing of each incident, like that once it happened just as they closed on the sale of her mom’s house.

There was also something more fundamental to be noted. The role of an alarm system is to keep us safe, which, when we’re young, is our mother’s role as well. That protective role was one of the hardest things for me to let go of as my two daughters matured. Perhaps this mother was pointing out her desire to continue keeping her daughter safe. Before we allow a surprising event to frighten us it behooves us to try to determine what our dear dead might be trying to say.

Synchronous experiences are easier to ignore than the beeps of an alarm system and we love to brush them off as coincidental. Again, I suggest we look for meaning. Heidi awakens at 2:22 AM convinced that her mother has died. Within minutes a call from the nursing home confirms this. Long after her mother’s death she finds that whenever she notices 2:22 on a clock, she strongly senses her mom’s presence. The time—2:22—becomes a kind of secret code language between them. Although I didn’t hear that this was true for Heidi, at times, the specific numbers may hold important keys to either the living or the dead. Sure, any of this could be “coincidence.” However, such experiences are often accompanied by an uncanny and difficult to describe (or to defend to a skeptic) awareness, a knowing. If we reject this knowing, we could be allowing logic to rob us of a sweet and profound gift.

I would love to hear how your dead beloveds have visited you from beyond the veil that separates life from death. Please share your experiences with me at https://anniemattingley.com/participate/ If you’d prefer to tell me your story verbally, let me know and we can arrange for that.

While you’re there, check out my Events page to see what I may have scheduled in your locale. The first two events are Book Release Parties in Taos, NM at SOMOS, 2 pm on October 7^th  and in Questa, NM at OCHO, 2 pm on October 8^th. I hope to meet you at one of these, or at another event.

The After Death Chronicles: True Stories of Comfort, Guidance, and Wisdom from Beyond the Veil. To be released by Hampton Roads on October 6, 2017. Pre-order on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and IndieBound. Find out more on my Book Page.