Eileen Garrett was born on the 17th  March 1893 in Beauparc, County Meath, Ireland.  Both her parents committed suicide shortly after her birth.  Her aunt and uncle adopted her and raised her. 

She loved dogs and horses, but was shy of people. They seemed to be insensitive to what she felt.  Her aunt was a very critical person, and Eileen found she could completely shut out the sound of her voice. So from an early age she discovered she had abilities most people lacked. She could also see people and children invisible to the adults around her, and touch objects and know their inner feelings and history. From the age of four onwards she had young playmates that her aunt could not see. Because her aunt taunted her saying they were not real, Eileen touched and questioned her ‘invisible’ playmates, but they seemed as real as her aunt. There was only one difference. When she looked at ordinary people she could see what she called a ‘nimbus’ of light - an aura - surrounding them. When she looked at the children they were all light. As the adults who looked after her punished her for playing with or talking about the children, she became secretive.

Psychic experiences always seemed to be part of  her life.  When she was very
young she saw her favorite aunt, who lived about twenty miles away, walking up the path carrying a baby.  As the aunt approached, she said to young Eileen,  "1 am going away now and I must take the baby with me."   Eileen quickly ran into the house to relate this to her adoptive aunt, who immediately punished her for making up a lie.  The following day she learned that her aunt had died in childbirth, along with the baby.  This strange introduction to death had a serious impact upon young Eileen.  She asked many questions but received no answers, least of  all from her aunt.  Distraught and in reaction to what she felt was an undeserved punishment, she drowned some ducklings which her aunt loved.  She recalls,  "The little dead bodies were quiet, but a strange movement was occurring all about them.  A gray, smoke - like substance rose up from each small form.  This nebulous, fluid stuff  wove and curled as it rose in winding spiral curves, and I saw it take new shape as it  moved out and away from the quiet forms."  Thus, at a young age, she became aware that
there was more to life than the physical form, and that this more separated itself from the body, at the time of  death.

Eileen Garrett claimed that she always sensed and saw various forms of  light and
energy around people, in animals and even around plants.  She also had imaginary playmates whom she called  "the children".  She said that their appearance was a very normal part of  her life and that she  "did not have to go to them in any particular place, or make any adjustments"  in order to see them.

Tragedy seemed to follow her.  Years later, her second fiancé died of  pneumonia.

She once had the opportunity to meet Aleister Crowley.  She described Crowley as "a rather rugged, athletic man with an undeniable force of  personality."  Once, while she was sitting with friends in the Café Royal, she was approached by the Great Beast who leaned over her table, took hold of  her hand, looked into her eyes and said,  "You are a pythoness....  and a strong one."  Miss Garrett further elaborates that Crowley  "looked at me intently with half-dosed eyes.  I remember that his eyes were protruding and his mouth betrayed a sensual nature.  He may have been anywhere between Thirty-five and forty at the time but in those days everyone over thirty looked old to me!"  He then took off  one of  his rings and gently slipped it onto her finger.  She quickly took it off  and gave it back to him.  "My giggling companions were somewhat surprised, and I, too, was startled not knowing what a pythoness was."  Crowley apparently  "just walked away slowly to another table and joined a few companions."

Miss Garrett also tells how Aleister Crowley extended an invitation for her to attend
one of  his 'black masses' which he often held at his apartment in Fitzroy Square. She describes the room as being draped in black with zodiacal signs embroidered on the draperies and filled with incense. She then states,  "highly intelligent men and women, both nationally and internationally famous, some of  them connected with government, attended these meetings.  Some came to partake of  a sacred cup in which, it was said, certain aphrodisiac substances were mixed to make union with Aphrodite herself.   The girls, 'virgins' of  the cult, had an eerie glow on their cloaks, and Crowley himself  wore a mantle with many zodiacal signs."  She continues by stating that  "there was a small altar with dimmed lights, and the cross was put on the left-hand side.  Many of  the women wept and made weird sounds such as I have since heard at meetings of  the Holy Rollers in North Carolina".  Was Eileen Garrett scared by all this?  Not really.  She writes,  "I have really seen more uncanny things in the voodoo rites in Haiti when the gods take control and where there are frequent
blood sacrifices.  If  there was an  'authority'  in Crowley's meetings with Lucifer, I never knew it."

Eileen Garrett further writes that much,  "has been written about Crowley, and much evil has been attributed to him.  If  he did have these occult powers, I think they must have been fleeting, for he often ran into monetary difficulties.  I remember, when he was being evicted from the Queens Hotel in Leicester Square, that I was asked to find money which would enable him to live at Brighton.  He did manage it somehow, and it was there that he died, cursing his doctor, I was told, with the anger of  a man reduced by illness and despair.  Some of  the faithful followers who remained with him to the end assured me that his body in death glowed with an intense luster."

In time Eileen Garrett left England and moved to America.  During her life she gained much notoriety as a famous medium.  She originally developed her PSI abilities under the spiritual guidance of  James Hewat McKenzie while attending the British College of Psychic Science  (1924 -1928).  She also participated in the experiments conducted by Dr. J. B. Rhine at Duke University  (1932 -1938)  and has worked with such psychic researchers as Dr. Herewood Carrington and Nandor Fodor, to name only a few.

SEEING HIDDEN WORLDS

Being so aware of  the living feelings in trees and animals, and feeling that adults were always lying to each other and to her, Eileen became very observant.  She learnt to watch and to feel things, to learn from experience and think for herself instead of  believing what people told her.  Because the aura surrounding a person was so obvious and visible to Eileen it took her a long time to believe people when they said they couldn’t see it.  To Eileen the aura told her a great deal about what the person was thinking or feeling, or their health.  She said,  “For me, the important thing about anyone I met, was to see and feel the quality of  their aura.  By their colour and their tone, I knew whether people were sick or well.”  Some people, she said, were surrounded by a grey mist, which showed how unhappy they were.  She could see that animals could sense these surrounds also.  When watching people she saw how the colours in their surrounds changed, showing how thoughts and emotions disturbed them when talking with each other.  She could also see, however, that people were unconscious of  what caused these disturbances.

As she was so sensitive to the inner feelings of  people, Eileen found school difficult, as she was in contact with so many people.  To heal herself  from the shock of  so many impacts, she learnt to allow her awareness, or as she describes it,  “a fluid part of  myself,”  to flow out to plants, trees and the earth, and feel connected with all living things.  This ability developed to the point where she could extend her awareness to people or objects at a distance and feel as if  she were part of  them. She could sense the innermost condition and history of  natural things, and the health and thoughts of  people.

DEATH IS A DOORWAY TO ANOTHER LIFE

This ability to see surrounds, and touch peoples minds, enabled Eileen to see death as something beautiful.  She watched animals and people as they died.  The light that had been the person or animals  ‘aura’ left the body at death, and started an entirely new life, one not restricted by the body.  When she was a grown woman, and gave birth to a son, she watched her baby die in her arms and she saw his subtle self  leave his body.  The pain of  his loss made her seek deeper for what happens after this departure.  She travelled to America to take part in scientific experiments testing telepathy and extension of  awareness – what is sometimes called projection or out-of-body-experience  (OBE).  One experiment took place while she was in New York.  Another member of  the team was in his house in Newfoundland.  The test was to see if  she could observe what the doctor in Newfoundland was doing and saying.  In such a test she moved her awareness away from her body to the distant place.  In this condition Eileen felt she was actually at the place.  She said  “I was able to see the garden and the sea, as well as the house I was supposed to enter;  I actually sensed the damp of  the atmosphere and saw the flowers growing by the pathway.  Then I passed through the walls and I was inside the room in which the experiment was to take place.”

I TRAVEL FASTER THAN LIGHT

So in this condition she didn’t have to be dead to be a  ‘ghost’  and pass through walls.  Once in the house she could not at first find the doctor in the room assigned. But within moments she saw him walking down the stairs with his head bandaged. As this was happening she told the researchers in New York what she saw.  So she was operating in two places at once.  She was able to describe to the team in New York objects the doctor had placed on a table for her, and also repeat words of  a book the doctor took from his library shelf and read.  None of  the team knew the doctor had injured his head, but after the results of  the experiment were sent to him, all that Eileen observed was confirmed.  The doctor had injured his head just before the experiment, which was why he was late entering the room.

Through taking part in such scientific experiments, and through support from people like Edward Carpenter, who had made a study of  the extra-sensory-perception (ESP)  she experienced, she gradually developed a view that life is continuous.
 “… Birth and death”  she said, are  “necessary phases of  an eternally changing cycle which strives towards the perfection of  man’s soul.”  Just as one day in our life is only a part of  a longer ongoing process from which we learn and grow, so she felt that our whole lifetime is like a day compared with the eternity of  which we are a part.  We have other  ‘days’ in this eternity, from which we will learn and develop. She also felt that her super-sensory abilities to see beyond what the eyes can see, to hear beyond her physical ears, to move through space faster than ever her body could, were powers that many more people will develop as they open their mind to such possibilities.

ENTERING THE TEMPLE OF THE ANIMALS

Eileen Garrett said that,  “In living close to the animal and plant worlds, I had come to understand that there seemed little difference between birth and death to any living creatures excepting the human.  How much unnecessary and hopeless misery might have been spared to man had he observed as I had the true nature of  birth and death.  I knew both of  these processes of  change to be joyful and equally creative.  Why, since the balance of  the whole universe is kept so perfectly by Infinite Direction, must man alone, of  all living creatures, fear for his place in the scheme of  things, and be so lost and frightened in facing what he calls death?”

Eileen says that by living close to animals she learnt things about life and death that many people fail to understand.  But Eileen didn’t simply stand in a field or wood and watch rabbits and badgers at play.  She moved into another dimension of  her mind, where she saw beyond what her eyes ears and nose showed her.  I am not going to suggest this is easy for most people to do, but it IS easy to start developing the ability to receive more from this inner life of  our mind.  One of  the simplest ways of  going about this is to allow ones feelings and body to have the opportunity to express spontaneously.  Most life processes express as spontaneous movement, such as our breathing, heartbeat, digestion, sneezing and yawning.

What we often fail to understand is that this also applies to the mind, and we see this in the process of  dreaming.  If  we can only learn how, the unconscious wisdom of our being can speak to us.  Lots of  ancient races discovered this and saw it as a holy experience.  In those races, the man or woman who couldn’t enter into this experience were seen as lacking a normal ability.  So the simple practice I am going to describe is aimed at creating a mental and physical readiness to allow ones wider mind to express, to communicate.  If  we have never experienced our wider awareness before it may at first seem clumsy, like someone who has been tied up for years trying to move easily.  So you will need to practice once or twice a week until it becomes easy.  You also need to be ready to let your imagination have some freedom, and not to stop yourself  expressing things by judging them as silly or pointless.  It is those attitudes that stop us from allowing our inner life. 

BEING A SEED

To practice this skill you need have about twenty minutes to half an hour when you will not be disturbed.  You need floor space, preferably on a carpet or blanket, big enough for you to lie full length on if  necessary.  It can be very helpful to have a sympathetic friend with you to watch.  It is also best to have fairly loose clothing enabling you to move easily.

When you are ready, stand in the middle of  your space.  Stand with feet about shoulder width apart and arms stretched above your head, making an X shape with your body.

Now close your eyes and hold in mind the idea of a seed - one that has not yet been planted.  It can be any sort of  seed you like.  Do not struggle with this.  It is enough to gently think about it.  As you hold the seed in mind compare it with the way your body feels.  Does the shape of  your body feel like a seed at the moment?  For many people standing with legs and arms apart doesn’t feel like an unplanted seed. So by following how your body feels and without trying to think it out, explore moving your body until you feel more like a dried up seed.  Learning to follow these simple body feelings is important.

WHERE WILL I GROW FROM HERE?

If possible, let your feelings and body sensations lead you.  Find a position that feels satisfying.  As you get to this, ask yourself  if  a seed is asleep, or waiting, or what it feels like before it is planted.  It can, after all, remain dry and without apparent life, for many years.  Without trying to be scientific, let yourself  have something of  the feeling of  the unplanted seed.  When you feel satisfied, shift yourself  into being a seed that has been put in warm, moist soil, and so can start to grow.

This can be a wonderful experience, and the way to get the most out of  it is to not think about how a seed grows, or try to act it out.  Simply lie in the warm soil and let things happen.  If you are not sure how to do that, remember that when you yawn or stretch in the morning, you don’t think it up.  Your body does the movements automatically.  So simply remain still until something starts to urge a movement.  Maybe it starts as a little twitch of  head or fingers.  Whatever it is, simply let it happen without trying to direct it or know where it is leading.

I CAN GROW FOREVER

As your growth starts let it happen and it will carry through to a point where you will know it is ended.  If  you have learnt to allow spontaneous movement - as you do when you yawn, sneeze, breathe, laugh or cry - then a most mysterious and wonderful emergence of  experience and feelings will arise that will be unexpected. Something you didn’t think up, and so is new, fresh and perhaps informative arises. Perhaps you will need to practice to get a very full experience of  this.  Perhaps you will hit it right first time and receive a wonderful experience of  being a seed. Whatever happens, it is worth practising again and again, because the source of  the inspiration that comes seems to forever have something new to show us.  I have been using this seed meditation for nearly thirty years, and I still find new treasures. Only a personal experience of  this amazing ability to produce the new can convince us of  the creativity we each have within