An Out-of-Body Night Visit From a Lady

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I once made the acquaintance of a student of anthropology, Mrs. E.S. of Belleville, N. J. More than once she experienced being out of her body, she told me, for instance, during her second childbirth. Mrs. S. didn't claim much control starting her out-of-body flights. But once they had begun, she had control over where she went.

            I casually suggested that she try "visiting" me in her out-of-body state. Nothing more was said of the matter.  I certainly didn't expect anything to happen.  I was wrong.

            Within a few weeks, the following occurred. First, however, I need to say that at that time I had begun playing the flute; in the morning I liked to practice for about an hour. A music stand stood by a large bookcase in the living room. I deliberately kept the stand in the same spot, so I was puzzled one morning when I woke up, went for my flute but found the stand right smack in the middle of the living room. I had no idea how it got there; no one else was in the house nor had I received any visitors the night before. I was puzzled for a moment but assumed I unconsciously moved the stand myself.

            Within an hour, I received a telephone call from Mrs. S. Without my mentioning the music stand, she recounted the following. The night before—it was around midnight—she found herself out of her body and decided to try to "visit" me. She did this merely by concentrating her attention; suddenly she found herself observing me reading in the kitchen. (I was, in fact, reading in the kitchen at that time.) My out-of-body guest hovered nearby but was unable to make any impression on me.

            She wondered how she could leave her mark.  After straying through the house, feeling a bit frustrated, she came upon the music stand and took hold of it with her out-of-body “hands," appearing to herself to succeed in moving it to the center of the living room. She then returned to her vacated body in Belleville.

            Here we have at least a remarkable chain of coincidences. On that morning, a skeptic could say, I unwittingly moved my music stand. Mrs. S. hallucinated paying me a visit, coincidentally noting just what I was doing at the time, and coincidentally imagining she moved the music stand I unwittingly moved.

            The alternative to coincidence is to say that somehow she actually did "leave" her body and was able to displace a physical object in my room. The story is one of many reported out-of-body flights; I cite it because I was an eyewitness to a displaced metal music stand weighing (with music sheets) over two pounds. What to make of it?  Did Mrs. S.—and can people—really "leave" the body? And while out roam around in space and move physical objects?