Skeptical? I have the book for you.
Extraordinary Knowing: Science, Skepticism, and the Inexplicable Powers of the Human Mind
By Elizabeth Lloyd Mayer, 2008.
I love to read. I love libraries, I love book clubs, and I love to attend author events. When it comes to Reiki and Spirituality, I’ve read a ton of great books. I have an embarrassingly large stack of books on my nightstand that I plan to get through “soon”. My partner goes to bed earlier than I do, but I still love reading in bed. I use a book light, or sometimes download books to my phone so I can scroll in the dark. If I absolutely love a book, I buy a hard copy and it becomes a reference. I’ll explore a few of my favorites in upcoming blog posts. But today, I have to start with a book that I recommend to people I meet who want to know how I, of all people, got into something like Reiki.
Simply put, this was the book that kicked it all off for me. It was June 2020, the time of Deep Covid, and I was down a midnight rabbit hole on Amazon. While scrolling through titles, I stumbled across this book. It wasn’t like me to read this genre, or to pay for a brand new, shiny book that I hadn’t first tried to find at the library. Even so, I ended up ordering it on a whim. Here’s the description that got my attention:
“In 1991, when her daughter’s rare, hand-carved harp was stolen, Lisby Mayer’s familiar world of science and rational thinking turned upside down. After the police failed to turn up any leads, a friend suggested she call a dowser—a man who specialized in finding lost objects. With nothing to lose—and almost as a joke—Dr. Mayer agreed. Within two days, and without leaving his Arkansas home, the dowser located the exact California street coordinates where the harp was found.
Deeply shaken, yet driven to understand what had happened, Mayer began the fourteen-year journey of discovery that she recounts in this mind-opening, brilliantly readable book. Her first surprise: the dozens of colleagues who’d been keeping similar experiences secret for years, fearful of being labeled credulous or crazy.
Extraordinary Knowing is an attempt to break through the silence imposed by fear and to explore what science has to say about these and countless other “inexplicable” phenomena. From Sigmund Freud’s writings on telepathy to secret CIA experiments on remote viewing, from leading-edge neuroscience to the strange world of quantum physics, Dr. Mayer reveals a wealth of credible and fascinating research into the realm where the mind seems to trump the laws of nature.
She does not ask us to believe. Rather she brings us a book of profound intrigue and optimism, with far-reaching implications not just for scientific inquiry but also for the ways we go about living in the world.”
For a long time, I believed that “science” always knew best. I was 100% sure that if there isn’t research supporting an idea, it probably doesn’t have merit. Reading this book opened my mind to the possibility that some things cannot be readily understood or studied under classic research conditions. And if a man in Arkansas can find a harp in Oakland with only a pendulum and a map, what else could be possible in this mostly unknown Universe? This question ignited an intellectual curiosity in me that sent me hurtling down the path I am on today.
Extraordinary Knowing is my wholehearted recommendation if you’re interested in kicking off your own learning journey. I hope you’ll read it and let me know what you think! I should also mention that my favorite books are kept on hand at my Reiki practice office in Almaden, and you’re welcome to borrow any that I have available. Book a Reiki session, and let’s have a mini book club meeting while we’re at it.
Love,
Michelle