AFTERLIFE MYTHS DEBUNKED! Kelvin Chin Unveils the TRUTH About What Happens When We Die

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Hi there, welcome to Grief to Growth Podcast. Your host is Brian D Smith, spiritual seeker, bestselling author, grief survivor, and life coach. Brian believes that the worst tragedies of life provide the greatest opportunity for growth. Brian D Smith says he was planted, not buried, and he is here to help you grow where you've been planted by the difficulties in life. In each episode, Brian and his guests will share what has helped them to survive and thrive. It is his sincere hope this episode helps you today.

Everybody, this is Brian D Smith back with another episode of Grief to Growth. And today I've got with me my good friend Kelvin Chen. And Kelvin and I have known each other for a couple years.. He's been on the program before. I consider him to be one of the leading experts in the afterlife and consciousness. I'm really excited to have this conversation with him today. So let me read you a short introduction. I'll bring Kelvin in and we'll have a conversation. He's the author and afterlife— he's an author and afterlife expert. As I said, his first book was called Overcoming the Fear of Death Through Each of the Four Main Belief Systems. It's a non-religious approach to overcoming the fear of death. It's an excellent book. I can't recommend it highly enough. His new book is called Marcus Aurelius Updated: 21st Century Meditations on Living Life, and that's a collection of 67 essays ranging from emotions, life principles, meditation, and the spiritual. Kelvin is, is the executive director and founder of the Turning Within Meditation and Overcoming the Fear of Death Foundations, and he's an internationally recognized meditation teacher featured in Business Insider, Newsweek, Kaiser Health News, and he's taught meditation at West Point and in the US Army, including in the DMZ in Korea. He's been meditating for 50 years. He's taught meditation for 49 years to thousands of people in over 60 countries. And his past life memories reach back 6,000 years. He's a graduate of Dartmouth, Yale, and Boston College, Boston College Law, and Calvin's lived in 7 countries. So with that, I'd like to welcome my friend Calvin Chen.

Great to be here with you, Brian. Good to see you again.

Yeah, Calvin, I'm really excited about having this conversation with you today. To let everybody know kind of what kicked this off. I talk about the afterlife and consciousness all the time. I had a couple of conversations the last couple of weeks that made me reach out to you. One was, I was talking with some people, and I won't name names. But someone was saying that when we die, that this person had an afterlife experience, that we remain as an individual. That the analogy of going back— a water drop of water going back in the ocean is not really valid. Well, a couple other people in the same conference I was in were conversing about how we do merge into the oneness. So this is an area that we talked about. So I want to explore that with you today. Sure. And the other thing I want to talk to you about is this idea of reincarnation, and people remembering past lives and claiming that they've been, you know, certain other people. So So, um, I just want to kick it off with that. So let's start talking about, I guess, which one would be easier? Which one would you pick?

Either way, I mean, it's, it's, uh, well, let's talk about the merging with the oneness thing because it's, uh, it, I think it's pretty, in my mind anyway, it's pretty easily understood and very, very easily misunderstood. I think that the whole notion of merging. And first of all, people got to understand what the words mean, because people use English language sometimes sloppily. So merging actually means losing one's individuality into basically what I kind of, you know me, Brian, I'm kind of informal guy, you know, into like cosmic soup or something. So people will, you use different words. They'll say they merge with God, they merge with the oneness, they merge with the universe, they merge with source, or they use different words, emerge with the absolute. They'll use, they'll use different words in different cultures and different religions and so forth. But though, but the, but the bottom line, simple English understanding and meaning of that is that you lose your individuality. You don't know who you are anymore. That's what merging means. Well, um, I'll come back in a second to where I think it comes from, but, but think about it. Does that even make logical sense? Because, uh, I know you and I know many psychics and mediums, and I've had some psychic— many psychic experiences in the last 50 years. But, you know, who are they, or who are we communicating with on the other side if they've died and they've merged? They have no individuality. Uh, you know, any psychic you hear may say, or a medium who you may say, oh, we merge with the oneness, they don't understand the English meaning of merging, because they themselves are communicating with who? They're not communicating with some inanimate cosmic soup-ness, which is really what merging means. So it's sometimes it's a simple misunderstanding. If a psychic says that, or a medium says that, they really don't understand what merging means. And okay, so it's a very easy thing to correct. Merging means no individuality. So where does it come from? I think it comes from the very genuine, real experience when people have NDEs. There's a couple of possible sources of this. I think first of all, this merging idea can correctly, accurately be called connectedness. I feel a connection with you, Brian D Smith, while we're doing this. It's this incredible connection that you and I have. Now we have a friendship that's built over a number years and so forth. And we've had a number of conversations online, offline, and so forth. But, but sometimes you'll meet somebody you have never physically biologically met in this lifetime. And there's a connection, there's something there. And sometimes you'll meet people who you, you don't even know, and really have never— you've been with them like 2 seconds, and there's a connection. There's all kinds of connections with that we can have with people. We might feel connected with people in Ukraine, for example, a connection. That's an energetic kind of psychic or energetic connection. That does not mean that I have lost my individuality, and I have merged and lost, lost all knowingness of who I am, feeling connected with people in Ukraine, and the suffering that they're going through, okay. But there's that connection, I haven't merged with them. Merging literally means you've lost your individuality. So what happens is when people have an incredible kind feeling of connection. If they have an NDE, and they go, oh my God, I've never been experiencing my mind as separate from my body. They've always been identified their, their mind, and they think their mind is their thoughts. For example, many people incorrectly think their mind is their thoughts. You're not your thoughts, and you're not your body. Your mind is the experiencer of that. That's what we call consciousness, soul, spirit. I use simple English call it mind. Mind as in the vastness of our mind, as well as the, the more localized waking state, making decision-making part of our mind. That's all my whole mind is, all of that. Well, if you don't have a regular familiarity with that, and you have an NDE, or you have a spiritually transformative experience— it doesn't have to be an NDE, a near-death experience, it could be anything— you just all of a sudden, whoa, you're, you're huge. You feel connected with everything. You feel as if you've merged. The keywords are as if. You haven't literally merged, because how could you tell people your experience afterwards if you had lost who you were? You haven't lost who you were. You retain that throughout the experience. It's just a different experience. It's like, wow. Okay. That's the simple— I think that's the simple understanding about why and how it's understandable why somebody might incorrectly use the word merging when they have this incredible, genuine, real experience of connection with all things inanimate and animate, living, non-living. I mean, I have that experience. I've had that experience 1,000 times in this lifetime. But I'm still Kelvin Chin. I haven't lost my individuality.

I love that explanation. Thanks for sharing that. Because as I was— and I discussed this with one of the people who were saying that we do merge, and they said when they had this experience that they were no longer themselves, and they were, they were, they— and I'm like, but then how could you be telling me about it? How did you experience? Because to me, merging equals annihilation. It means I no longer exist.

That's right. That's right. That's right. That's what that means. You no longer exist. That's what merging means. So people use it in spiritual communities very, very loosely. And English language— and I'm not a word Nazi, you know, but in certain cases, it's really important to use correct English, or French, or Russian, or whatever language you're speaking. The meanings are important of our words, because otherwise, why are we communicating? And the other thing that, that's important about these kinds of words that we're talking about is because they very subtly affect us deep inside, and they may shift our belief systems, which then may shift our thinking, will shift our behavior, will shift our outer actions, and it affects our life. So that's why, uh, there's certain words like merging and ideas like that that I think really do need to be scrutinized and thought about and understood properly. Otherwise, it can lead to suffering.

And, and you know me, I'm the anti-suffering Yeah, well, I think that's what you and I are all about. It's— we're about anti-suffering. We're about ending this fear of death and overcoming the fear of death. And I think for someone like myself, who was as a child, had a great fear of death and a great fear of all this stuff. And then I hear this idea of merging, I think, again, I think annihilation, I think this is the end of my existence. And I don't think that's what they really mean. Because they say, well, you're not going to merge until you're ready. I'm like, well, when will I be ready to cease to exist? Because that's what you're saying.

Exactly, exactly. We're never ready. My experience is to put anybody's, you know, those are people going, oh my God, you know, people who are worried hearing this so far. My experience is that we don't merge. My experience is that we are eternal souls, and we go on forever, that there is no beginning, no end. Now, there may be a beginning of me being a human being, there may be, or even an animal, you know, before I was a human being, you know, whatever, depending on how you look at all this, there may be a beginning to me being on planet Earth, maybe I wasn't on planet Earth. So there may be beginnings, but not to my essential nature, which is what I refer to as my mind, soul, spirit consciousness. I think that's, that's, that's the identifiable energetic pattern that Kelvin Chin. And I think Brian D Smith has an energetic, identifiable energetic pattern that's recognizable on this side and the other side, or anywhere on any planet in the universe, or universes, or whatever the universe— I mean universe, the biggest, biggest thing. It's— that's how I define universe, right? And, and, and, and whether your energy is there, here, well, I'm— I can recognize— I'll be able to recognize it because you have an identifiable energy pattern that in my experience and my logic tells me is, is eternal. It's, it's first law of thermodynamics. Energy cannot be created nor destroyed. No beginning or end.

Stay with us.

We'll be right back.

You know, one of the hardest things about grief, most of the people in your life just don't get it. They want you to be further along than you are. They get uncomfortable when you bring it up, so you stop bringing it up. And that's why I started writing. My Substack is where I go deeper. Thoughts I don't always get to on the podcast. Essays on consciousness, on continuing bonds, on what it actually means to carry a loss and still build a life. The stuff that used to keep me up at night, written out in a way that I hope meets you in the morning. But here's what I didn't expect when I started it. The community that showed up. People who are doing exactly what you're doing. Listening, learning, trying to find their footing, readers who comment, who share their own stories, who remind each other that none of us are as alone in this as we feel. And that's what the Substack has become, a place to go deeper with me and to find your people. It's free to subscribe. Find me at grief2growth.com/substack. That's grief, the numeral 2, growth.com/substack. Or just go to Substack and search for Grief to Growth. I hope to see you there. Yeah, and I think, you know, I like to— when I hear someone say something, I'm like, okay, I think everybody is at least 10% right on pretty much everything they say. And so I'm like, what is it? What is the truth in this? Where is this coming from?

What?

And, and that's what I'm trying to— that's what I like to get at with you, because We're not saying that these people are just wrong, that there is, there is some experience like that. And I have a good friend who had an NDE, had several NDEs. And we were talking about the idea of reincarnation. She's like, I'm not really sure whether I believe in it or not. But in my experience, I saw these beings, these spirits, and I think they were past lives, but I'm not sure because you're so close that you feel like you're, you're merging, you you meet someone or you see someone and you immediately know everything about them. So you kind of feel like they're you.

Well, that's different though. So once— so when, when you first— like, when I first started having communication with other beings who I couldn't— they're, you know, they're in physical— they're not physical biological beings, but on the other side, it started happening to me, as you know, in 1986, just spontaneously. I've never done any past life regressions or workshops on how to communicate with the other side or anything. It all is just spontaneous with me. But it took me a while. It took me a good at least a year, it might have been a year and a half or 2 years for me to discern, for me to distinguish, like, is it my making this up? Am I watching too many sci-fi movies? That was Star Trek, you know, Captain Kirk, you know, it's like, what am I been influenced by all that? And am I making this stuff up? Or is that actually not me, you know, what's me and what's not me. So this idea that this person who said this to you couldn't tell, and that's very normal. So first thing I tell people is like, relax about it. It's normal. It's, it's, it's a new experience, and you got to figure it out. But as long as you're kind of still paying attention and questioning, I think questioning is a really, really valuable tool. As opposed to blindly just following whatever, just questioning it and looking for other external reliable evidence that supports your interpretation of the experience. So back to your point about at least 10%, right? I think people are probably closer to 99%, right, about what they're— they think their interpretation of their experiences, but whether it's objectively right is who, you know, and then you kind of get into this conundrum of what's really absolutely right. And I write it in on my afterlife classes that you've sat in on sometimes, you know, the first time, first session that I say is, if you're looking for absolute proof about anything about the afterlife, then, or this life, even here, You're barking up the wrong tree, because, because they're the only black and white proofs that there are, are certain mathematical proofs where there is a right answer. And there's a wrong answer. And you know what, you as a former engineer, you know what I'm talking about, what a mathematical proof is. That's, those are provable. Everything else, you know, the proof of heaven. I mean, I know I like Eben Alexander, don't get me wrong, you know, he's a good guy. I've met— I've talked to him many times. But, but, but, you know, I'm sure his, his publisher came up with the title because people want proof. They want absolute, ironclad proof. And when you're talking experiences, whether it's on experiences on this side or the other side, look, you have people go to New York City, you can't get— take a dozen people, go to New York City, you're going to come out with 50 different interpretations from those 12 people of what New York City is. Did they all go to New York City? Yes, objectively, we can say that they went. Does New York City objectively exist? Yes, we can all agree that it exists. You listen to those 12 people's 50 different interpretations of what it was like there. And notice that I'm saying 50, it's not 12 interpretations, it's going to be— they're going to be— each one's going to have multiple interpretations on different days you talk to them. It's no different on the other side, or with any of these experiences. So I tell my students, you look for two things. 2 things to give you some— we'll call it assurance. I don't want to call it proof, but some assurance that it's— you're moving in the right direction. Is, is that right direction, meaning you're understanding pretty much what's going on. First thing is reliable evidence. Is the evidence you're drawing conclusions from, from about this, you know, around, you know, reliable? And then the second thing is, have you thought about it logically, rationally, clearly? Or have you jumped to conclusions all over the place? And now that requires a certain level of self-awareness and ability to be self-critical, which not everybody has. Okay, because a lot of people get swept away with the emotional feeling, and then they shelve their rational mind. And to me, our mind is both rational and emotional. They are not— you don't— you can't separate them, really. You really can't. They are fluid. And so are we more swept away by our feeling part of the fluidity of our thinking? Or can we have that? Not, not put it aside, but have it along with the ability to discern. To me, that's what— that's how I define clear thinking. I don't define clear thinking as only rational and forget about your feelings. I think that's experientially impossible. Yes, it's not the way the mind works. Okay. Don't, don't, don't try to— don't start out setting up an impossibility for yourself. So anyway, back— reliability of evidence, And does it make sense?

Yeah. And I realized we kind of jumped into this because I was so excited about talking to you. I want, I want to establish for people who don't know you who you, who you are, what your experience has been. So tell me about how you got to the point where you are.

Yeah, yeah. So, well, we'll just talk about this lifetime first. Okay, so this lifetime, because everything else before that is also got this lifetime. I guess I was born with something because my aunts, my mother's sisters, told me when I was a teenager that I used to talk to invisible beings when I was 2 years old at my grandparents', in my grandparents' living room. And I had blocked it because they had somewhat kind of shamed me in a way or made fun of me a little bit. You know, it's like, and because remember, I remember when they told me this when I was a teenager, when I was in high school, I get pissed off. My first was pissed off at them that like, and I, whoa. And so, and I realized in retrospect, I was pissed off at them because they had kind of teased me about it when I was 2 years old and I had shelved, I have, I had buried it. So that's a third party telling me that something that I had buried, that I, that I did, you know, every weekend for how long I did this for years or whatever, at my grandparents' house. Later, when I was 19 years old, I learned to meditate. And that's really the thing that I proactively did myself that started opening doors up, but it didn't open up doors. Well, it probably did, but I didn't realize that it was opening up spiritual doors for me because initially, but Initially, I learned because I was just stressed out. I was so highly anxious, I was just desperate. And that's why I started meditating. And I— a guy, meditation teacher was talking about scientific, scientific research. And I was into science at the time. I was pre-med at the time. And I thought, whoa, this is what research on what? Close your eyes and do what? And it's like, and so that hooked me.. And, and then he started talking about anxiety and cortisol levels. Then the initial studies that they were doing in 1970, they were just starting to do, there was Herbert Benson, and he's a cardiologist in Boston, was just starting this research. And, oh, and I, that got my attention because I was so highly anxious. Cortisol levels, anxiety, you know, lactic acid, different stuff balancing. So I learned, and then I later, about within 6 months or something like that, I volunteered in, and I was in the experiment. So I was in, I was a test subject in the very first medical studies on any form of meditation done in the United States, 1970, 1971, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Scientific American magazine, etc. But that's what got me into this arena, because about 7 years later, after meditating every day, twice a day, and I became a leader in Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's meditation organization at the time. And an international leader for about 10 years. And about 7 years into meditating, that's when my past life memories just spontaneously opened up. And I didn't believe in reincarnation. I didn't— you thought if you told me, hey, what's— let's talk about reincarnation, Brian, I go, yeah, Brian. Yeah, right. I would have been polite, but like dismissive. And then about 16 years into meditating, that's when I just spontaneously opened up, 1986. To the other side. So that's what— and then all this stuff is, is continued, as you know, to present day. And it's very fluid. It's not a big deal to me anymore, although it was initially. It was like, like I said, I thought I was watching too many Star Trek movies. But it's very normal to me, the transparency between this side and the other side and, and so forth.

Yeah, I think it's really interesting. And this is one of the things I think that why I resonate with you so much, because you started with this with a rational approach. You didn't come with, you know, what we call woo-woo. Like, I want to go find past lives and stuff like that.

Yeah, it just stumbled on— it stumbled onto me, or into me, out of me, out of me, I guess is the way it was. The memories just came out of, out of really out of nowhere. And the first one was a dream that I had, that I didn't know was anything related to past lives. I just thought it was a dream. You know, I've had dreams, you know, most people, not most people, but a lot of people remember their dreams. And some people have very, very vivid dreams. And I've always had pretty vivid dreams. And as I've continued meditating over the last 50 years, my dreams have gotten more vivid and more clear and more lucid, etc. More colorful, literally colorful, more color, etc. But back then, in 19— it was like, I think it was early 1977. I had this dream, and it was so powerful emotionally. I was so upset. It was the most upset I'd ever been in my life, never mind in a dream or waking state. And it just really upset me. And, and then I thought, I forgot about it. I figured, oh, it's just an upsetting dream. People, we all have upsetting dreams sometimes. I probably just releasing a bunch of old junk and whatever. So I tell my students now, my meditation students, because it happens in dreams and so forth, we're releasing stuff. Okay. So I forgot about it for probably like, I don't know, it was 4 or 5 months or something like that. And then I was on this TM, Transcendental Meditation, I was a teacher then. And I was on a, like, I guess they called it an advanced course retreat, meditation retreat, you would call it, for TM teachers. And we were doing energetic movement exercises of not just meditating, but also adding, you know, afterwards doing some energy movement, we'll call them Kundalini-ish, if people know what Kundalini is, just moving the energy through the, through the system. And most of the people were just kind of bouncing around on the foam on this hotel floor in Wilderswil, Switzerland, we cleared out the dining room and, you know, no furniture and put it in the basement or something. And then we just had foam mattresses wall to wall. And so we'd have group meditations in there. Most of the— and it was all guys. So most of the guys were, um, you know, bouncing around. The women were in a different hotel, whatever. And they were just bouncing around, getting these energy rushes. And I flipped over on my back, like flipped over on my back, completely spontaneous, involuntarily, energetically. My feet are up in the air and I was like this. And I was being crucified, and I was going through reliving the crucifixion experience, but, but it was upside down. And it went on every time, every day, every group meditation with about 75 of us in the room, every day for a couple of weeks. It went on for years after that, but for those couple of weeks, it kept going on every day. And, and so we buddied up, and we, you know, because we keep an eye on each other, was part of the program, you know, like make sure your buddy's okay. And, you know, you know, you go for walks together. So I went for a walk after lunch with my buddy George, George Hammond, and, and we were walking up through this pastoral, beautiful setting in the Swiss Alps and stuff. And I said, you know, I had this dream, George, I don't know why I'm telling you this, but I had this dream, maybe it was 4 or 5, 6 months ago or something like that. And I was lying in a ditch on the side of the road, and I was crying. I was really upset. And I was just all dirt in my mouth and everything. And actually, no, I didn't even get that far into it, Brian. I said to him, I had a dream. And it was really upsetting to me. That's all I said something like that. And then he finished and he said, yeah, you were in the ditch inside of a run. This is what you were wearing. And you were crying. You were there all night. I said, well, I didn't even tell you that. How'd you know? Did you read my mind? He said, no. He said, I said, I, because he didn't read minds. He said, no, I don't read minds. He said, I just, I just, I'm the guy who found you. I found you there. I said, what are you talking about? So this is like, I wasn't into reincarnation, you know? And he said, I said, what? He said, yeah, I found you there 2000 years ago. He said, you've been crucified 2 weeks now. Every time we meditate in the group, you know, you're flipped over on your back and you're, you're feeling the physical and emotional pain of being crucified upside down, you know? You know who you are? And I said no. And so I never paid attention to stuff really in the Bible and so forth. So when I went to Protestant Sunday school, which is because my parents said we had to, so, but I didn't pay attention. And but George was Catholic altar boy and all that, paid attention. And plus, he has a photographic memory. But he said, oh, yeah, it's so that's when I first started getting glimpses of the the Simon Peter experience. And it was completely spontaneous. And then I started relaxing into it. And it just all kinds of other stuff opened up. And then I started having other past life memories too, that had nothing to do with that one. Just completely spontaneous. Over the next— well, to present.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's, that's, that's, that's interesting. That's really a fascinating way that you, you kind of came into— not kind of— that you came into this. So I Would it be fair to say maybe the meditation opened you up and then allowed that, allowed that to come through?

I think so. I mean, that's me, my, my educated guess. Yeah, yeah, high probability, we'll say.

We'll get back to Grief to Growth in just a few seconds. Did you know that Brian D Smith is an author and a life coach? If you're grieving or know someone who is grieving, his book Grief to Growth is a best-selling, easy-to-read book that might help you or someone you know. People work with Brian as a life coach to break through barriers and live their best lives. You can find out more about Brian and what he offers at www.grief2growth.com, www.grief2growth.com, or text growth, G-R-O-W-T-H, to 31996. If you'd like to support this podcast, visit www.patreon.com/grief2growth, www.patreon.com/grief2growth to make a financial contribution. And now back to Grief 2 Growth.

High probability.

Yeah, that leads me to the second— another reason why I contacted you because someone contacted me and I've done the interview but hasn't come out yet. And this person said, I was, I was John, I was John in the Bible, the guy that wrote the Gospel of John. And I know about your experiences. And I want to lead into the 30th November, things that we haven't talked about before. So I want to, I want you to share with me why it is you feel like you, you know, you've had these experiences.

Why I've had the experiences? Well, who knows? I mean, it's just an experience that's opened, opened up in me. But It's hard to say because my next experience shortly after that was being a Carthaginian slave as a very, very dark, very dark black African slave in around that, I guess around 2,300 years ago, around 330. You know, what's that, through 3,300 BC. So who knows why you have these experiences? I've been known individuals and very unknown individuals. And some, I, you know, that was a slave.

I didn't ask the question the way I meant to. So the 30th of November, I want you to tell people what the 30th of November is. And how you came to this realization of the 30th of November.

Oh, well, the 30th of November, first of all, the 30th of November, what it is, is an event that I helped organize. Okay. I helped organize an event and it's called 30th November. You have to put 30th November in a dot com. If you have people go to the website, 30th November dot com, they'll see the talk that's there. And there's a lot more than the talk that you and I've seen there. I know you've been there to the website. So it's a 3-hour talk. It's a very long talk. You're probably going to watch it in segments. On the history of spirituality on planet Earth in the Judeo-Christian, Islamic, Vedic traditions. So that's 4. And if you don't— those of you don't know, the Buddhism comes out of the Vedic tradition, okay? So it's an offshoot of the Vedic tradition. So out of the 4 major, the big ones in the— on planet Earth, there's 4,000 supposed religions, but the 4 big ones, the history of them over the last 10,000 years, So they've been thought about. There's been a lot of, you know, thinking about those religions by the founders of those religions for 10,000 years. All right. And then they've manifested obviously, at different times over the past 10,000 years period. That's what that talk is. It's a talk given by George Hammond, and George and I have known each other this lifetime since he was 18 and I was 20 years old. We taught meditation together years ago. And we've, we, we, we've triangulated history, knowledge of certain history, historical points to figure out and certain personal memories that we go back about 4,000 years. When I was an Egyptian priest, and he was a Jew in, in what we know as Egypt, ancient Egypt. So 4,000 years. So we've known each other for a long time. He gave that talk. George is a— let me just say a quick thing, and then I'll talk about the 3rd of November thing in a second. George is not a psychic, as I said earlier. So he is— he was a mergers and acquisitions a global, um, law firm lawyer partner in a law firm for many years, 25, 30 years. Okay, so those of you who know anything about law or anything about mergers and acquisitions, never mind global mergers and acquisitions, mergers and acquisitions, those are big business deals where businesses are coming together across borders of countries, being funded and so forth, hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars $50 million. You know, those are small deals, a $50 million deal, okay? You got to know your stuff, not just legally, you got to be able to think very strategically and incredibly logically, rationally. So George got a download when his sister died in his house, from what we now refer to as our friends on the other side, we call them the movement because they call themselves the movement because these, these leaders who started the Judeo-Christian, Islamic, Vedic traditions gave him a download to share with us at this 30th November event that happened in 2014. So it was 30th November, 2014. Uh, so I helped organize that and basically it was a download about what their thinking was over this 10,000-year period when various beginnings, we'll call them, of those different, four different traditions got going and changed here. And why did the, for example, for most of the listeners probably are probably coming out of the Judeo-Christian, you know, background. So for example, why did Jehovah start changing from the prophetic approach to doing something different with Jesus and John the Baptist. Okay, which is kind of what we were just dipping our toe into a few minutes ago. Right, right. So why did that happen? So this is all part of the 30th November talk. It's very— because Jehovah, Jesus, John the Baptist, Shankara, those of you who know who, uh, any, you know, any Vedic tradition, uh, knowledge is Shankara is a Vedic, you know, a seer, a sage in the Vedic tradition. Also Vyasa. Shankara was Vyasa in a previous lifetime. And Vyasa, many people, most people know what the Bhagavad Gita is. So in the West, we, most people have heard of the Gita, the Bhagavad Gita, G-I-T-A.

Okay.

But the Bhagavad Gita is a story within this larger story called the Mahabharata. Vyasa, remember, what did I just say? Shankara, in Shankara's previous, in a previous lifetime, many thousands of years earlier, Vyasa wrote the Mahabharata and the Bhagavad Gita. So these individuals who are the progenitors of these various major, four major traditions on planet Earth for the last 10,000 years-ish, ballpark, gave George a download. That's what the talk is, the 30th of November, why they did certain things and so forth. And so what, and what, what is the thinking going forward? That's that, to me, that's the primary thing, because a lot of people will be historically interested in stuff. As I already disclosed to you, you know, I don't know a lot of the history and, you know, in Judeo-Christian stuff, because Kelvin Chin, disclosure, I was not paying attention in Sunday school. So, but To me, the going forward, how do— what, what are these ideas that were thought up, you know, and discussed and then promoted over the last, you know, let's just say 2,000 to 10,000 years? What of those have changed? What have not changed? And so forth. And so how, in other words, how do we move forward?

Yeah, yeah, I've listened to the talk, and it is fascinating. You know, it's, it's really interesting to me. I was raised in the Christian tradition. So I know the Bible very well. And when I was deconstructing the Bible, I learned it even better. So I learned about the history and all that stuff. And it's really interesting when you, when you look at the Bible, you can see God, and I'll put that in quotes, changing from the very beginning to the time of Jesus. I mean, And some people say, well, it's not even like the same person. Right. So, you know, the, when you go through the talk, it really explains some of this, you know, why, why would, why would that be?

What, what Jehovah, what Jehovah is what most people, many people refer to as God or Allah, same thing, you know, Jehovah is the personality, the name of the personality. What was Jehovah thinking at these different stages, as you're saying, in the Old Testament, this and that, and the New Testament, etc.? What was Jehovah thinking? Because the thinking did change. That's what was interesting. Yes.

Well, you know, and even, and even as we use the term Jehovah, because there are people now that still use the term Jehovah, like Jehovah's Witnesses, but they, they think of this being Jehovah as the ultimate, the ultimate creator, the, the, the, uh, the source. And from my understanding, that's not, not the case.

It's, it's not the way Jehovah views himself, let's just say. So Jehovah is okay with how other people view him, but he views himself in a certain way. So there, there, what came out in the discussion, so I was part of these discussions in the run-up, because I was helping organize this for about 11 months before it happened, started, we started organizing in January when George's sister tragically died, and then she came and introduced them basically to George. That's the short version of that. When he was in the shower, literally after she died, 2 or 3 hours after she died in his house. So I've been privy to conversations with these, you know, there's about 15 or 20 of these, we'll call them personalities is the word I like to use, on the other side now. And yeah, he does, he doesn't care how people view him. They can view him as capital G God in the way that you just described. Some people will view him, and he's okay with that. He's not here to try to change people's beliefs either, about how they view him. But I'm just saying he doesn't view himself in that way. And as far as these what many people refer to as these very highly developed spiritual beings— Jesus, Jehovah, John the Baptist, um, uh, Swami Vivekananda, Saraswati, Shankara, who used to be Vyasa, and there's about another 15 or 20 of these, uh, spiritual— we'll call them spiritual leaders, you know, throughout the history of Earth. Um, nobody has ever met or knows about a capital G God. They're not saying that there isn't one that exists. They're just saying we don't— we— none of them— none of us are what you guys think.

Right? Well, and that's, I guess what I was— you know, it's interesting, because I came to this conclusion, even before I left Christianity, because we were taught that you're going to go to, go to heaven, it's going to be this big place with the streets of gold, and then the gods could be sitting on a throne. And I was like, I'm pretty sure I'm never going to meet God. It just seems, you know, going back to your logical thing, I don't think God would be a being sitting on a throne. That just, that doesn't seem too small to me.

Exactly. I always say, if there is a God, so I don't like to pour water on people's belief systems. As you know, I take people from wherever they are. But let's think about it. Let's assume there is a God in the capital G word that people are thinking. Would God be a slave owner and want to control everything and make everybody do what God wants? To me, that's a small-minded person. That's not a capital G God. It's not even a small g god. In my mind. It's not a very developed— it's not a very developed human being, never mind, you know, being on the other side, whatever. It's not a very developed mind. It's not a very developed consciousness, a very limited way of viewing life. So to me, if there is a capital G God, then that being would say, yeah, everybody, free will, you know, you do what you want to do. I ain't gonna be a slave owner. I'm not keeping you on the plantation. It's like, no, I'm— everybody is free to do whatever and you figure stuff out. You know, if there is a capital G God, that's to me, that's what love is. And so Jesus's definition of love, for example, is accepting the other person for who they are, not who you wish they were. Well, if that's Jesus's definition of love, do you not think that capital G God wouldn't also use that definition of love, accepting everybody who they are, not who you wish they were? Not judging people, or, you know, that letting people judge themselves and other peers of theirs, give them consequences to their actions. That's a good way for people to sort things out, I think.

Yeah. And this, this, again, this is kind of one of those things I came to kind of on my own as I was going through this, this process, you know, I looked at Jesus and I was like, I love Jesus. Jesus is cool. I looked at God, I'm like, God's not so cool. You know, the way that I was taught, you know, right, right, right, that it's this binary black or white, you're going to heaven, you're going to hell. It's all based on what you, you know, what you believe. Someone just the other day, when I put a near-death experience on YouTube, all the Christians come out and start telling me how evil it is. And there's no such thing as reincarnation. And just read your Bible. And, you know, you know, you're saying that people can do whatever they want. You're saying that murder is just cool.

So murder is not cool. Murder is part of the free will choices that somebody could make. In my opinion, it's a bad choice. But is it, is it, is it as a choice somebody can make? Yes. So it's not— see, the idea of free will is really misunderstood. Free will is just personal choice to do whatever. There are consequences to one's actions. You don't just get a hall pass. So, but, but there's not karma in the— see, the, the origins of karma 10,000 years ago that this movement that I just described was, you know, kind of came up with was to try to control people's really, really bad behavior. Because what would people do in 10,000 or 100,000 or 200,000 years ago? They're, they're sacrificing, they're killing who, and who are they killing mostly? Sacrificing to the gods, women and children. Why? Because they're physically weaker, and you can submit them easier, right? And so they're killing, and then there are wars and everything else. So they're looking at this from the other side, the movement, they go, this is, you know, what, how can we move these people in these, these, these souls and these beings in a little bit more of a positive direction? Oh, how about teaching them that there are consequences to one's actions, the whole idea of karma, we'll call it. Well, then it evolved or devolved, in my opinion, it evolved over the thousands of years to this thing where, oh, now you got mounds of karma, and you get all these credits for doing good stuff. And you get debits. It's like an accounting system. And those of you know what debits and credits are, you get negative stuff, debits for doing bad stuff. And there's this big magical accounting system in the, in the sky somewhere. No, This— but are there consequences? Yes. And do people remember from lifetime to lifetime that you messed them up? We'll just use that euphemistically. Messed them up. Yes, they remember. Might they come back at you and you have a consequence from that? Yes. People never forget. So that's a whole other discussion about forgiveness. But people never ever forget. Stuff, good stuff and bad stuff on some subconscious, sometimes very conscious level, but at least on a subconscious level, it's, it's registered.

Now that you're here at Grief 2 Growth, I'd like to ask you to do 3 things. The first thing is to make sure that you like, click notifications, and subscribe to make sure you get updates from my YouTube channel. Also, if you'd like to support me financially, you can support me through my tip jar at grief2growth.com. It's grief2growth.com/tipjar. Or look for tip jar at the very top of the page, or buy me a coffee at the very bottom of the page, and you can make a small financial contribution. The third thing I'd like to ask is to make sure you share this with a friend through all your social media, Facebook, Instagram, whatever. Thanks for being here. So I want to talk— obviously, we both believe in reincarnation. I think it's pretty clear from the conversation we're having thus far. But you know, this idea that so many people when they do quote, remember past lives, they're always this Cleopatra or, you know, Joan of Arc or some, some major character. And some people, you know, think they're characters from the Bible, for example. Why might people have these feelings?

Yeah, it makes sense to me to some degree. I mean, So, so people, um, first of all, let's dispense with the idea that I hear sometimes people say, well, there could be, you know, 6,000 Cleopatras out there because, you know, people— no, no, there's, there was one Cleopatra, okay? There's one Brian Smith, there's one Kelvin Chin, all right? There's not going to be another Kelvin Chin, there's not going to be another Brian D Smith. There may be other Brian Smiths, but not another Brian D Smith, okay?

Right, right.

And same thing with Cleopatra. But why could somebody very passionately and genuinely think that they were also Cleopatra, even though this other person said Cleopatra? There are a whole host of reasons. There could be, there could be just kind of obvious reasons, like they, they, they resonate with Cleopatra, because they did like a term paper on Cleopatra when they were a kid, and it just bubbled up. And then later, they started having spiritually transformative experiences that were very real.. And that opened them up. And then they both, they projected subconsciously, their real connection and love for what they researched in this lifetime about Cleopatra. So that could happen. That's pretty kind of simplistic, pretty obvious. But they could be much more complicated than that. It could be like, you know, like, let's say, you know, somebody in this lifetime, who actually was listed, who thinks they're Cleopatra, Brian, But maybe in reality, X thousands of years ago, when Cleopatra was alive, that person was actually one of Cleopatra's personal assistants, or one of their— somebody who will just use the word worship. I know she wasn't, you know, but she was worshiped like a god at times, right?

Okay.

Yeah. So who was that close to her? And was physically in that time period and maybe even physically, physically in her presence many times. And that person, let's say that's— that happened. And then let's say 500 years later, that person is now a high priestess in some other religion that is revering women like Cleopatra, maybe not Cleopatra personally, right? Blah, blah, blah, and it gets reinforced. And then fast forward, let's say 1000 years from then. Now they're in— they've started some institute about Cleopatra. All right. So I'm not doing the math here. But you know, maybe it's like, well, it looks like it's around 1300 AD now. 1400 AD, when's the printing press? So, you know, 1440 in Gutenberg. But let's— so let's say it's around 1500 AD. Okay. And now they've created an institute and they got all these books and they printing and they've done it and they're the head of that institute about Cleopatra. There's something that resonates, really resonates. Okay. And now, and now fast forward to now 21st century Earth. Okay.

Mm-hmm.

21st century, you know, 5, 6, 700 years later, they do a past life regression and their past life regression picks up on, on, on, on, not all the specifics I just laid out. But this incredible connection says, yeah, I'm getting something really strong about Cleopatra. I think you were Cleopatra in a past life. Maybe the person independently does. But you can see how that cascade of very real experiences could lead to that. So that's why I say there's no absolutes, including with my memories, and so forth and so on. There's no way of absolutes now. But now that's why I say look for reliable external evidence, for example. And so I have— I, you know, I'm writing my book now, my fourth book. Well, my— it's now— I'm telling you now for the first time, you're the first person to hear this, Brian, but I think I'm going to reorder my books. And my memoirs about my past life is going to be my next book that's coming out. And then I'll get to my related fears about death and dying at the— my fourth book.. But I am talking about this stuff and all of these crazy triangulations that I've had with, with these memories that I had. I don't always, I don't get into it all in my talks because it would take too long. It's gonna be a book, right?

Well, I think, you know, when we talked about this earlier, that's why people can be genuine about this. And, and there's, but there's many different sources to tap into when we talk about consciousness. And we talked earlier before we started recording about the Akashic Records. Another way that we could— another thing that we can tap into.

Absolutely. Yeah, I call it the superhighway of data, of information, because I try to stay away from cultural and religious lingo. As you know, I work across so many countries. And, you know, if I sounded Muslim, then the Hindus wouldn't talk to me. If I sounded Hindu, or Vedic, the Muslims wouldn't talk. I want everybody to be— these concepts to be available to everybody. So I don't call it the Akashic Records. I call it the superhighway of data or information. It's, it's inanimate. Those of you don't know what it is. It's inanimate energy field, we could call, of information. It's not a consciousness, not consciously aware. It's just data that exists. It's kind of like if you could imagine an energy computer field or, you know, a database of everything that's ever happened and existed And people have experienced whatever's happened up to this point in, in human history or in history. And you could tap into that and think, oh, wow, I tapped into, you know, whatever. It's really hard to say, you know, with absolute certainty.

And it's— yeah. And, you know, I was telling you, I'm reading a book right now about mediumship and this kind of stuff. And the guy's a very accomplished medium. And he was talking about how people sincerely, when you're reading someone, for example, you think you're having a medium reading, you can tap into the sitter, you can tap into a discarnate soul that's not the person you think you're talking to, you can tap into the Akashic Records. There's so many different ways you— things you could tap into. And unless you really have that discernment, or can triangulate the way you're saying, then you can't really know.

Yeah, the medium can tap into the person, the client sitting there, and just reflect back to them what they're already thinking or believing. Or the medium can tap into their own stuff, and maybe doesn't have a clear filter set up to keep their stuff out of the conversation. That's tough to do. It's very tough to do. But yeah, all of that is possible.

So yeah, there was a couple other things I want to talk about where I could talk to you all day. We're kind of running out of time. What was the other thing? I just lost my train of thought. There's another question I wanted to ask you about. I'll get back to that. I wanted you to tell people about different things you offer, like there's Turning Within. I know you teach a class on the afterlife. And I know you're gonna be talking more about the 30th of November coming up shortly.

Right? Yeah. So I've been teaching meditation, as you said in the intro, for almost 50 years now. 49— is my 49th year teaching meditation, thousands of people. And so I offer classes and I teach people. It's a 4-day class. It's about an hour the first day and a couple hours on the subsequent days. I give lifetime follow-up. I don't charge extra for the lifetime follow-up. And lifetime follow-up means lifetime follow-up means you text me, email me questions, you meditate with me privately, whatever. It's, I do it, it's lifetime. Sit in on the class forever and ever, ever, just as a refresher. Life, forever. No charge. Just show up. So that's a class that I've been teaching for many years. I've made it much easier than what I used to teach when I taught TM in the '70s. I call it Turning Within. There's no— I've removed all the cultural and any quasi-religious references to the teaching. As I said, that's why I can teach across all cultures and religions. And I've made it even simpler, made it easier, more flexible to do. So I do that. I help people with fear of death issues. As you said, I have this, you know, my first— this is my first book. This is what the first book looks like as an audiobook. I do the audio narration of it. There's obviously— this is the paperback, and there's an ebook, so forth. And then this is the— this is the Marcus Aurelius book, which is a collection of 67 essays that I've written over the last 10 years. So I help people with overcoming the fear of death and help them get past that. The debilitating effects of that, and so that they can live their life more fully. And I take a non-religious approach to everything that I do. And then I teach afterlife series. So if people are interested in that, I have a 6-part afterlife class, and another one is starting on October 9th. And it's every other week. So I give people 2 weeks to kind of digest the information because it's dense, it's really dense. And for a lot of information, 2-hour sessions each. And so they can find it on kelvinchin.org. Or they can, you know, subscribe to my YouTube channel, just, you know, search for me, Kelvin Chin. But kelvinchin.org is my more spiritual website. Turning Within is the turningwithin.org, my meditation. Overcomingthefearofdeath.org is my fear of death one. And then I have a book one, book website. So I keep them separate because not everybody has each— is the needs of that all over. I keep them separate that way.

Well, I can say I haven't taken the Turning Within course, but I've heard people that have, and they— people just rave about it. So it's— people say it's just really helped the people who've been meditating for a long time make breakthroughs. So I'm definitely going to do that. Your Afterlife course, I have taken it. It's, it's, it's awesome. I know the question I was going to ask you, because I really want to get this while we're talking.

Yes.

This notion that there's no time on the other side.

It's wrong. It's a wrong idea. And once it— but it's based on a misunderstanding. The misunderstanding is what time is. So people, when they have an experience on the other side, I understand why they would say that. But they don't understand time is a measurement of change. That's what time is. Time is not a subjective experience. That's what people think time is, that human beings make up this thing we call time. No, time exists in the universe, whether there are human beings or not. There is change in the universe, and it can be measured. How we measure it in the increments of days, minutes, seconds. Yeah, we made that up. Okay. You know, the calendar used to have 10 months in the year. Now it has 12 months in the year. Back in Roman times, it's 10 months. So yeah, we change. We can change that, change that up. But time is a measurement of change. Does change exist on the other side? Yes. How can you be talking to somebody? How can you have an experience on the other side if change doesn't exist? Change only does not exist if there's cosmic soup and no individuality and you've merged and you are— there's nothing. There is no heaven. Okay, that's what then yeah, okay, you could say time doesn't exist. There's no, there's nothing, there's no change. But there is change on the other side. Who is the psychic and the medium talking to? Who is the NDE-er having an ex— where are they having an experience? They're having it in something they call heaven or the afterlife or whatever they want to call it. Valhalla, you can call it whatever you want. But it's, it exists. And if it exists, it exists within the field of change.. And if it exists in the field of change, in the continuum of change, we'll call it, then it can be measured. That's what time is. So it— so people misinterpret that because they think it's subjective. It's like, well, I'm on the beach in Hawaii, and time didn't exist. Because, you know, next thing I know, it's like, Sunday, we got to go back, I got to go to work on Monday. Now, it feels like as if you're not experiencing the second-by-second clicking of your watch hand of time. Yeah, that's accurate.

But the—

but change still existed when you were on the beach in Hawaii. It didn't stop and you didn't merge into some cosmic soupness. That's what people, if they understand what time is, they go, oh, okay. Because it's like, you know, does—

does—

it's a subjective experience of time. It's different. In Hawaii, when you're punching a clock in the factory. Okay. But does, does marriage exist? Yes, it exists. It exists. It's a legal institution of two people, whatever you want to call marriage. Okay.

Does it exist?

Does it exist different? And subject— do people describe marriage different subject— differently subjectively?

Yeah.

That doesn't mean that marriage doesn't exist because you can describe it subjectively different. That's what people are doing when they think Oh, time doesn't exist because it's like so crazy. No, it's just maybe faster or slower, or however you want to describe it on the other side. In other words, the subjective experience may be different. It doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Yeah. And I think that's— and it's really interesting when people do have near-death experiences, they'll say something like time didn't exist, but then they'll describe events, they'll describe, you know, conversations or logically inconsistent.

It makes— it's completely 100% illogical. And they don't understand that because again, this is sloppy use of English, okay? They're not using the English language and they're not using their logic properly. It's not going to cause them a lot of suffering. This, this notion, but the problem is this notion does merge, no pun intended, into the merging idea. And that's what can cause suffering. That's a problem.

Yeah, I think, yeah, I think you're right. And for me, it's all about, as we said at the beginning, you and I are both about, you know, preventing suffering, reducing suffering as much as possible. I don't really care what people believe until I see some people come to my YouTube channel, and they'll see a near-death experience and say, Well, this guy didn't mention Jesus, therefore this, none of this could be true. Or this guy said there are dogs in heaven, there's no way there could be dogs in heaven. So therefore none of this could be true, because they're so bound to this interpretation of the Bible. I had someone the other day. Yeah, just the other day, someone commented on my videos and said, well, if it doesn't line up with the Word of God, and she used capital W of God, then, you know, you can't believe it. And I said, the Bible is not the Word of God. That's why.

Yeah, there's so many, there's so many people who believe that the Bible is— was somehow, as I think you— I heard you in one interview say, it just kind of like dumped on somebody's lap and it was all gold-bound, right? You know, gold-bound already. You know, it's just, you know, but people like that, you can't really— they're not, they're not rational thinkers. So to me, my, my audience will say, the ones who will resonate with me are ones who really want to understand things clearly. The ones who really don't want to understand things clearly and just want to kind of sit in their emotional comfort zone without thinking. In other words, they do bifurcate, and I don't think it's bifurcated, but they believe that their thinking can be bifurcated from their emotions, that they just want to sit in that feel-good state and not question that the Bible is the Word of God. They just believe that. That's, that's not my target audience. My target audience is people who want to understand things clearly, and really move forward with their lives in a, in a way that's less and less suffering. Yeah, really less and less suffering. And not everybody is there. And I'm not here to change people and try to convince people to be there in that mode either. Some people, some people want to suffer. And that's their choice. When we say free will, It means anything, choice of any. Yeah. So here's the thing. One thing we did want to mention is about this 30th November idea that I am going to have a talk, an interview like this publicly in a couple of few weeks. I haven't set a date yet. I'm working with somebody to set the date where I'm just going to talk about general overview of 30th November topics. I'm not going to get into the nitty-gritty of what George talks about, that the download from the, the, you know, the movement on the other side and so forth, the Jehovah, Jesus, John the Baptist, Shankara Vyasa, Swami Brahmananda Saraswati, and so forth, and other leaders, spiritual leaders, that movement. I'm not going to get into exactly what they said, but I'm going to talk about topics and I'm going to give a preview of it in a session in a couple of weeks. And then I'm going to wait a month and then I'm going to do a Q&A. I'm going to lead, I'm going to facilitate myself a Q&A after I've given people a month to go watch the 30th November talk and write down questions and this and that. I'm going to do in November, I'm going to do a Q&A.

Yeah, I'm really excited about that. As I said, I've watched the video. I think it's fascinating information to take in and from my perspective, you know, you talked earlier about your target audience. Um, there are people that don't want to suffer who are trapped in some of these beliefs. And so, you know, for— there are people like yourself that when I was trying to come out of this, I'm grateful that they were there for me. I'm grateful you're there for me to kind of help me, you know, put some of this stuff together, because I do want to think logically and rationally. And that's, that's my audience, is people that say I'm willing to explore and listen, and then check it out for yourself. I always tell people, I don't expect you to ever believe anything that I say, you know, check it out for yourself.

I say the same thing, exact same thing I say at the beginning of all my class, that you take what I say that makes sense and you shelve the rest. And maybe you shelve it forever, or maybe you just shelve it for 2 months or 2 years or whatever, and you take it off and you look at it, dust it off, you look at it, go, oh, I can see what he's talking about now. Or maybe you never do. But my goal is, is to reduce fear and suffering in the world so people can live more freely, whatever the incremental— not that you're living a utopian life, because I don't think anything is ever perfect. Everybody is— we can choose to move and develop more fully and live more happily. My goal is to help people think more clearly in that way.. And if I can help people think more clearly, I have set themself up for whether they believe it or not, in future lifetime, past lives, future lives, reincarnation. I have set them up whether they hang out on the other side for a long time and then come in much later, whatever, after 1,000 years, they can do that. But whenever, whatever their future life is, I have set them up to be happier. Because if you can think more clearly and make better decisions, you'll have a happier life. It's not that complicated a formula. Having a more clear, logical, rational way to think about things that's not cognitively dissonant, that's not overnight easy. Right, right. But the goal of having a more clear thinking mind and soul, spirit, consciousness, whatever you want to call it, as we go through what I think my logic tells me is an eternal journey of living. That's my goal of helping.

Awesome. Well, Calvin, thanks so much for doing this. I really appreciate you being here. I hope— well, not I hope, I know people are going to get a lot out of this. So thank you for being here.

Great, great, great to chat, Brian. Again, anytime.

Thanks for listening to Grief to Growth. Brian hopes that you find this episode helpful, and will come back for future episodes. Brian D Smith's bestselling book, Grief to Growth: Planted, Not Buried, is a great resource for anyone who is coping with grief or knows someone who is. If you enjoy the podcast and would like to support it, there are 3 things you can do to help. The first is to share the podcast with someone that you think it will help. The second is to go to iTunes, rate and review the episode. The third way you can support the podcast is by becoming a patron. Head over to www.patreon.com/grief2growth. That's P-A-T-R-E-O-N.com/grief, the number 2, growth, and sign up to make a small monthly donation. Patrons get access to exclusive bonus content and knowledge that you are helping to spread the message of grief to growth. For more about Brian D Smith and grief to growth, Visit www.grief2growth.com.

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