When people take the unexplained too seriously.

Question: Do some people believe in you too much?

Gerard Senehi: Yeah, well I always like to make the distinction between psychic and spiritual that they’re not the same thing because sometimes I get people who respond quite strongly and then they assume that it must be the expression of something higher or some expression of God or something like that and of course that’s crazy but I do it by making the distinction between the psychic realm and the spiritual realm--because that’s an important distinction because we often assume if we experience something that’s not normal to our experience that there’s deeper or higher to it and that’s not necessarily the case.

Question: Are science and spirituality incompatible?

Gerard Senehi: I think spirituality can be approached in a profoundly objective manner because it has to do with the reality of our experience and our experience it’s important to be objective about our experience and we can quantify our experience, we can look at it objectively and that’s…that’s really important and we can look at that and recognize that something is deep versus something is not deep. We can recognize very objectively motivations, pure motivation, impure motivations. So, I think we could be very objective.

I mean, science has given us an incredible tool and at the same time we have to have the capacity to expand our consciousness. We have to have the capacity to let go and connect with something that we can’t hold with our minds but yeah we could still be objective as to whether we are doing it or not. So, there is still an element of profound rationality and reason. I think sometimes spiritually people think we should discard reason and…I think there is different sides to it because reason’s really important and our capacity to also let go and transcend reason is also really important.

Question: How do you pursue truth?

Gerard Senehi: Well it’s really something that we’re all collectively engaged with and it’s great to just kind of say, “That’s what I’m interested in. That’s a part of me.” And of course, we all should be interested in truth we…It doesn’t get the kind of recognition and it’s almost like, “What, you’re interested in truth? “And actually it should be “Well, of course.” You know, and isn’t it great what we can just say that and say and pursue that and explore what it means and not be afraid also of…of it’s implications because often if you’re interested in truth; part of it is like, “Well, who’s truth are you talking about?” And it’s like, “Wait a minute we actually are here to discover more and to get closer to truth.”

We don’t want to just kind of flatten it all out and say, “There’s no truth. That’s not possible to discover truth.” So, this is great. It’s great to; because I think also it may create space for all of us because it’s something that we’re all discovering together. It’s not just something that one person is going to figure out but we actually have to really kind of claim that it’s even possible.

Recorded on: June 4, 2009