Language of Love with Dr. Laura Berman - Grief, Healing and Evidence of An Afterlife with Liz Entin

Episode Date: August 13, 2025

Liz Entin didn't believe in an afterlife. She wasn’t spiritual, and she avoided thinking about death. That changed after she  lost her father. His death didn't just bring grief, it sparked a search for answers. In this episode, Liz shares how that search led her into quantum physics, reincarnation research, and mediumship. We talk about how she went from skeptic to believer after encountering evidence she couldn’t ignore. She even tested psychics using fake names and burner phones, trying to confirm or debunk what they said. Liz is the author of WTF Just Happened?!: A Sciencey-Skeptic Explores Grief, Healing, and Evidence of an Afterlife and the host of the WTF Just Happened?! podcast. What makes her story unique is that it’s based on firsthand experiences and real evidence, not blind faith. Liz discusses: The moment she realized life after death couldn’t be dismissed The University of Virginia’s reincarnation studies that shifted her perspective Her secret tests of mediums with Google Voice numbers, fake names, and burner emails The signs and synchronicities that changed everything for her How she accidentally gave her own mediumship reading How afterlife awareness shifts the grief journey  Liz’s story is about more than loss. It’s about discovering something deeper in the wake of tragedy. If you’ve ever questioned what happens after we die, or if you’re hoping for a sign from someone you’ve lost, this episode is for you. Want to learn more about Liz? Check out her books, her podcast, and her grief-meets-science salons at wtfjusthappened.net Follow her on Instagram: @wtf_just_happened_ And if you’re curious about your own healing, I invite you to explore my Good Grief Course. It's filled with tools, practices, and support to help you connect and grow through loss. If this episode touched your heart, or if you have a story or sign to share, email me at [e-mail]. We’re in this together. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, I'm sex, love, and relationship therapist, Dr. Laura Berman. And for the past 30 years, I've been helping people just like you learn to love and be loved better. Here on the Language of Love Conversations, I'm talking to some of the world's most influential and revolutionary experts, thought leaders, spiritual teachers, and celebrities about love, sex, and relationships from a mind, body, and spirit perspective. And that way, my goal is to awaken your mind, body, and soul. It's time to become fluent in the language of life.

After the unexpected death of her father, Liz Enten set out on a deeply personal and evidence-based search to answer life's most mysterious question. What happens when we die? A self-described skeptic, Her journey led her to interview top scientists, mediums, near-death experiencers, and ultimately write two books, WTF Just Happened, A Sciency Skeptic Explores Grief, Healing, and Evidence of an Afterlife, and her second book, WTF Just Happened, A Sciency Skeptic Investigates Even More Evidence of Afterlife and Fights for Justice with Her Dead Dog. She also has a podcast, What Happens When We Die, where she continues to explore what consciousness is, what death really means, and whether love ever truly ends. Now, this episode will be a bomb for the doubters and the seekers, whether you're grieving a loved one, unsure what you believe, or craving some spiritual grounding, Liz is bringing

clarity, honesty, and heart to the conversation. We're going to talk about signs from the other side, the most convincing afterlife evidence she's encountered, how her grief journey evolved from all of these discoveries, and what it's like to keep loving forward even after loss on this episode of The Language of Love. Liz, thank you so much for joining us on The Language of Love. I'm so glad you're here. Thank you so much for having me, Dr. Laura. I'm so happy to be on.

Okay, good, because we are going to dive into it. So many of my peeps here, certainly all of us, are going to have loss in our life if we haven't already. But we talk a lot about loss, about grief, about healing, about the role it plays when we lose love in whatever form it is, and a lot about the afterlife, which, as you know, is something I'm really into. And one of the things that I love about your story, and it's really your ongoing story, is that you're essentially a skeptic and your journey, which I think is true for many of

us, kind of your journey into the more metaphysical realms, which has been quite a journey, really began and grew out of the loss that you suffered of your father. So let's just start there with your father's passing as the catalyst for this journey and how your grief shaped this pivot in your life where you started delving into exploring the concept of life after death. Yeah, it really that was the only thing that got me first thinking about this. I mean, of course, I think we all think about it, but I would just do my best not to. It was kind of something that always haunted me. And I thought there was zero chance of an afterlife. So anytime thoughts of death would come into my mind as best as I could, I pushed

them away. They just felt horrible. And I mean, not that it feels great now, but you know, I mean, I have a whole other dialogue around it. And so unfortunately in 2015, my dad got sick. He had a stroke and first, you know, I mean, I just think I couldn't face it. I wasn't that worried. I was like, he'll be fine. He'll be fine. And then he got moved to hospice. And that was the point where I was like, yeah, I mean, really no, aside from statistical miracle, nothing was going to work. And that's where I had my very kind of two thoughts led me down to the path for the very first time. And the very first one was, I thought, what if I could turn back time in some way? I mean, for all we know, we're doing this all the time, but we don't know it because if memories are

being manipulated or who knows? I mean, so I just had that thought and that maybe we'd find a way that get like future generations, like in 10,000 years or whatever, to come get him on this day. Yeah, maybe, maybe, you know, medicine's a whole other issue. So I Googled that and I found out you can manipulate time. It's not this linear thing we think. And this is according to Einstein and all these theories of physics and then that led me to if that's not the exact way what else you know so I start reading about like dimensions like strength theory which I always found very interesting and then that's which led to like my life-changing thought and that was at the time I thought consciousness was created by a brain and when your brain dies that's it but then

my thought after that was it seems actually statistically impossible if you think of the concept of eternity, eternal big bangs, big crunches, that another set of brain neurons won't create someone else that you get to be. Kind of like reincarnation, but I never would have used that word at that time. And that wasn't as good as being like me with my dad again. But when your whole life, you basically just assumed after you died, like eternal obliteration, I'm like, I'll take it. And you can even think statistically in like trillion to the trillionth power years, you maybe evolve where you are you again. Who knows? And so that changed everything because then I thought, if that happens and seems almost definite, it does. Is there some mechanism

we don't understand where some of the memories have ever carried over into another life? And I Googled that. And that's where I found the research of doctors, Jim Tucker and Ian Stevenson. And I don't know how familiar your audience is with them, but if not, I can explain who they are. Yeah, I'm very familiar. University of Virginia, right? Yes, yes. I'm into it because I don't think we've talked about this a lot. So go for it. Okay. So Dr. Ian Stevenson passed away, I believe, in like 2001 and at an elderly age. And he and Dr. Jim Tucker at that point took over his research.

They are child psychiatrists, professors of psychiatry at the University of Virginia. very what the normal person would call normal people and science-minded, and they start studying cases of kids with past life memories. And University of Virginia has a department that they're part of. I believe Dr. Ian Stevenson was the one who founded it, and it was funded by Xerox. And it's called the Division of Perceptual Studies, and they have just piles of researchers. They have people who study near-death experiences and all from psychic mediums, all from a very science-based perspective. So I just like huddled in bed and I read every book by Dr. Jim Tucker, every book by Dr. Ian Stevenson, their studies. And I just I was like, if this is true, this changes everything.

And I mean, their approach was very logical, like matching up memories and finding the person that they would have aligned with. And then talking to the current family and they were just using such logic data, nothing like you associate with reincarnation, like, you know, all the they were like a child would talk about a specific outfit or experience or the kind of street they lived in in their past life or what they used to like to do. And then they would go and talk to the family or find the house or they were confirming the kind of factoids that these little children could have not possibly known without having there was no other explanation. Pretty much, yes. It was just remarkable. Like I can even share one of the cases, like the most famous one, the James Leininger case. That's where, so Dr. Jim Tucker started researching a three-year-old boy and his parents had, I guess they tried everything and they found him just through researching. Their little boy was having nightmares every night, like waking up screaming, plane on fire, little man go down. He was playing constantly, airplane crashes. His father took him to a museum, an exhibit of like World War II airplanes or maybe like Army Air Force airplanes. I don't remember the exact, but he knew things that only an expert pilot would know. And no one in his family was a pilot and no one had flown in the Air Force. And Jim Tucker researched this and he found more and more.

I mean, one part, the little boy had, I believe, three little Air Force dolls. I forgot the exact hair color, but they had like distinct hair colors, one, I think, blonde, one red and one brown. And he gave them names. Long story short, it's a very long and absolutely mind blowing case. He ends up tracing the family of the person that James Leininger remembered being and even finds the army buddies and the hair colors matched up to names of three men who'd been in the Air Force with him. He met his sister who was like now in her 90s. And they've done that with a couple of cases. And actually, they now have like thousands of cases.

Yeah. And so as you're diving into that, this is interesting because I'm always really interested into what you went through and what's led to the work that you're doing now isn't a kind of awakening, right? That's what I think of it is like awakening to a whole new truth. And for many of us who were living for most of our lives kind of in the 3D realm, often it's these huge losses, especially when someone we love passes, that drives us to just start cracking open the door a bit. And then once you peek through the door and you're like, holy yet,

what the hell is this? Then you start diving more deeply into it. And that's what leads to the kind of awakening. And I'm always interested in what the path was, right? So for you, it was diving into reincarnation. And then my guess is, and you know, you'd already been exploring quantum physics, the principal tenet of which is that energy can't be created or destroyed, right? And we're pure energy. So if we can't be created or destroyed and can only change form, maybe we take a different form when we're no longer in these bodies, right? So your entry point, it sounds like, was diving into all this exploration of reincarnation, this idea that the soul could potentially be eternal, right? That the essence of who we are may come back again. So

that's where it started for you. And I guess that was a big shift in your belief system up until that point. And was your father still in this realm here as you were discovering all of this? And did you share it with him? He was still here at the very beginning. He wasn't conscious enough for me to share it with him. So I was unfortunately not able to. And he was having some of the phenomena that people talk about, like deathbed visions. He was having conversations with his mom who'd passed away years ago.

But I didn't know to appreciate that then. Because you hadn't dived deep enough into this world yet. I hadn't learned about that. So I still thought I thought these were hallucinations of his brain. And I was like trying to get him sane, even if we have him for another year. But now I know he was sane. He was just betraying realms. So, yeah.

And that's what I think is so beautiful. I mean, there's all this is one of the beautiful things about social media is that you now see all of these hospice workers sharing these beautiful stories and normalizing this reality that happens for so many. I would say the vast majority of people on their deathbed start talking to, speaking of seeing, communicating with, reaching for loved ones who have already passed. The other thing, just as a side note that I've noticed having been with now four loved ones as they transition, is that they all, I now know, like for the last two, I knew, okay, they're about to go within the next 24 hours. when they start saying, trying to get out of their bed or put on their shoes or where's my suitcase? It's like, it's time to go. They'll start saying, we gotta go.

And they'll start trying to get up out of their bed or put on their shoes or start, it's like they're being told it's time to go. And so they start bringing it into 3D. And every single time I'm now like, okay, I tell my other relatives or whoever it is, like this is gonna happen now. It's time to really say the final goodbyes.

It's really profound. But I don't want to digress too far from this because the rest of your story is so beautiful and interesting. So what was the moment? Obviously, this was really opening your eyes. You first are diving into the reincarnation question. Then your father passes. and what was the moment or experience that really made you say like, okay, there's something going on here with that or in general that made you really start diving into all the rest? And then we'll talk about what you dived into. Oh, it was a long process. I think researching, like once you get into the division of perceptual studies, you find everything. So I think first it was like other layers of all these cases. Like I was reading, I just thought that I wasn't smart enough to see the catch, you know, that not that I don't think not to knock myself,

but, you know, I thought you would have to take someone like a Stephen Hawking level. And so I just kept reading all the skeptic rebuttals and they'd all been addressed in the books. None were strong. Then I found Carl Sagan wrote about Dr. Ian Stevenson and he, and he said he thought his research was really thorough and there was something there. He said he didn't think it was reincarnation, but he hadn't really delved in. He just thought it was valid. And that was like a big changer in terms of reincarnation, as well as starting to find all these credentialed people, you know, University of Virginia, Dr. Bruce Grayson studying near-death experiences. And then I found other research groups like the Winbridge Institute, Dr. Julie

Bischel studying psychic mediums using up to quintuple blinded studies. So really the first layer was reading and reading and reading. And the pivot was seeing how valid these people were and that no rebuttals were valid and that even Carl Sagan and people who'd worked with Stephen Hawking, like Sir Roger Penrose and Dr. Stuart Hameroff were writing about theories of how consciousness could not be created by the brain and could survive after. And it was just like That was really the thing was the first really, oh, my God, this very same people talking about this in a very same way and the mass amount of them. Right. They weren't these cuckoo birds. They were valid, rigorous scientists that were now validating what you were reading.

OK. And then what about because you write about an experience you have. I'm trying to remember the details because it was a while ago that I read your book. I think it was in the kitchen. Right. Am I remembering? Well, you tell me what the incident was. I might be making that up. There were so many experiences. So this is where it changed was I was like, I've got to start getting experiences. So I was having little ones. I mean, there's so many convention like signs I was getting my first medium reading. When you started going from reading, reading and being like, holy poop, this is actually real science. There's not a good way to debunk this, you know,

and you didn't grow up with any kind of sort of like me. You didn't grow up with any big spiritual practice or belief in spirit or God or higher power or faith in that or anything like that. You are all practical and pragmatic and it's everything has an explanation. And now you're diving into stuff that you can't explain away. Exactly. So I think big shifts and this is where like, because I wouldn't say there was one shift. It was like shift after shift after shift. I went from layer to layer. And I moved from reading all the science to starting to have some experiences. I had my first medium rating. I started reading books, some books from mediums as well. And I was like, oh, that's, that's too weird. I don't know. But maybe I ended up getting on a waiting list

for one medium and booking another medium. And I went to this medium, like my identity disguise, she knew things she could not have known I mean it was like fact after fact and I was just like I left and I just was like oh my god this is real like she knew my dad's favorite color she said he was sending it to her in bursts and it's not just like oh he likes that color he had a separate room in our apartment painted all that color he'd always wear that color he'd always get like candy in that color it was like very central that this was his favorite color yeah and it's interesting because I was reading that when I was looking through your books that, and I was thinking about it through the lens because some of my dearest friends are really gifted mediums. And I'm

thinking of one in particular. So when you would go, and maybe you still do this, but when you would go to the medium, you would disguise your identity so that they couldn't Google you or whatever. And she has told me before that when people come to her, she knows when they have disguise their identity and it's kind of like a weird dynamic for her because she knows it right and then it also can sometimes make the for her i don't i mean obviously this isn't true for everyone but it can make the reading harder she's like i wish i would just like i'm not googling them i wish they would just tell me their name so i thought that was interesting that this is your skeptics strategy right you would go in it and you do you still do that when you see mediums you

don't tell them anything about your, you still. Yeah. Oh yeah. I still do it almost all the time. There's sometimes where like, I can't cause it'd be too awkward. Cause I volunteer, which was a huge pivotal turning point as well. I volunteer with the forever family foundation. And for people who don't know it, they're a group that, you know, a grief support group with a lot of grief retreats. And they also use science-based testing to certify mediums. I try to like get readings with as many of their mediums but sometimes I haven't and I meet them then at an event and they're like oh Liz come have a reading with me and I know them too well to be like to be able to pretend to be someone else yeah yeah and I mean they're having moments a little where like I have it's it's been

awkward it's funny they know I'm skeptical but some mediums say people do it and they don't care doesn't affect anything some say you know I have heard some say what your friend says too because they'll like feel an energy from the name and I have went to some who right away like it's really funny there's this one Janet Mayer who's a wonderful medium and I'd sent like a false information into her and she said she just had like a funny feeling beforehand that when she got all the information from me she was like something feels like this one has like a secret There's something really weird. Like she said, it was like an off energy, like some big, deep secret. And then I ended up meeting her at the very first Forever Family event before my reading. And then I felt like I had to tell her it was me. And she just laughed. She's like, that's what that was. so that's what Susan says like something just feels kind of knocks her out of whack and it's

hard reading but I understand like wanting to it sounds like that's also your personality you just have a skeptic's personality which is a good one to be doing this kind of work at least because I think all of us have that part of us at least if not a lot of ourselves that are skeptical and am I really making all of this up? And is this really legitimate? And you've spoken now to dozens and dozens of scientists, mediums. So have I. You're a death experiencer. Tell us some of them that have made like a really big impression or really shifted things for you. If you can think. I'm sure there are. Each one does in their own way. I think when I got to meet Dr. Julie Baishal and have her on my podcast, that was a very big shift because she's a pharmacologist. She is so logical and she

uses up to quintuple blinded studies to test psychic mediums. I could go into some of her studies if you would like, or, you know, anyone can read about them. Yeah, tell us one of them. I don't know her, so I'll have to check her out myself. Oh, Baishal? Baishal, B-E-I-S-C-H-E-L. and she is co-founder along with Mark Bacuzzi of the Winbridge Institute. And she's one of the first people whose books I was reading. So it was kind of, she was very hyped up in my mind. And like in the very beginning, it was like, Oh, I hope she's real. I hope she's real. I was so nervous. She wasn't, I was so nervous. The medium she was testing. I thought maybe it was like all this big fake thing that like psychics.com or something not to, I don't know if there are a lot

of charlatans valid yeah are and i'm gonna ask in it for some advice on finding good ones but keep going with julie okay so one of her studies for example is and this was conducted a while ago so this was like not you know people would like call on landlines for example and so she would have sitters people getting the readings and mediums the sitters didn't know which medium would be reading them. They didn't know who the mediums were. The mediums didn't know who the sitters were. All they'd be told is they were calling a phone number at a certain time. And I believe the mediums were given the first name of the deceased person to connect with. And the sitters would just answer the phone. Again, this was like done during landline time.

So they were just calling the wind bridge numbers. You couldn't just Google the number. They had no way of getting the information. So they would call and they'd have to get very specific information like who the relationship with the person who passed a special memory their hobbies their occupation and some are getting up to 90 percent highly accurate you know not things you could just know and that was life-changing I was like if that is true and then there were other layers of blinding like the sitters would like turn in their reading then they were given there was another component of another kind too, where somebody else like a proxy sitter would sit there. So the medium would not even be able to read the sitter's mind. And the sitter would be

given two readings and they would score them and have to choose which one they thought was for them. And, you know, they couldn't be totally drastically different. It wouldn't be like someone's grandfather and someone's like sister, you know, they'd have to be the same gender around the same age otherwise. And it was amazing. They were getting that highly accurate. And it was just like so many layers of blinding. I mean, she did a lot of variations, but there were some where the sitters, the person who they handed it to didn't even know who the mediums were. They'd be giving it to another person who'd give it. So it was like indirect, indirect, indirect, because that is one of the proposals of the skeptics is that they aren't actually

connecting with the other side. They're telepathically reading your mind, which in in and of itself is pretty profound, but it's not evident of life after death, which is what they're trying to establish. So I do think it's kind of funny when skeptics who don't believe in anything are like, well, she's just reading her mind. I'm like, well, that in and of itself should blow open your skeptic mind. But I understand that that's not what the point is. Yeah. So that's really fascinating. I'll have to dive into the Winbridge Institute a little bit and check it out. But, you know,

what we also think is interesting, speaking of mediums, you were sharing, I think this was in the first WTF book. You were sharing your trip to Lillydale and tried to debunk, and you did debunk one guy who was supposedly having a sex

and you found his little tools. So you have, you have, and I want to ask you about those stories too. Some of the times you found out people are fakes because there are lots of fakes. Most of us have no idea

how to move through loss. There's no roadmap to follow when you're trying to navigate grief. And I realized this when I lost my son three years ago. As a therapist who understood grief, a whole new level of pain opened up to me when I lost my 16-year-old son. And since then, I have been building resources

that have allowed me to navigate through loss, not only in a healthy way, but in a way that has transformed me for the better. We can move through the most terrible loss with grace. And that's why I have created the course, Good Grief, Healing from Loss with Love. You can find it on my website, drlauraberman.com, right there on the homepage, as well as free resources letting you know how to support others who are going through loss. None of us has to do this alone.

first of all i have two questions the first one is what do you suggest to people when they're thinking about seeing a medium have you created some sort of resource list or do you have any advice for making sure as best you can that you aren't going to a faker because there are lots of fakes out there there are a lot yes i have an old pdf on my like blog post my website I need to update it because I wrote a while ago and I'll give the tips because, you know, I've added and edited since then. So especially with like facial recognition technology, things are a little different. So this is for the most skeptic. And I mean, some people still want to go in person or want to do Zoom.

And I don't be so crazed that you don't do that. But if you're like top level skeptic and like researching at this point, you might want to just take into account facial recognition technology as an option. So that if you Zoom with them or meet with them in person, they might be taking your image and getting all kinds of information on you in the back room is what you're saying. Exactly. I don't think they are. This is for if you think there's zero chance of an afterlife, you're in grief, or you want to do your own research project. So, you know, I think the average person who's a little skeptical take, pick and choose among these. So I'm just giving the most extreme just to clarify.

So do phone. Use a Google voice number. Say you don't want to do video. have a friend pay, not a family member, a friend, and not like your best, best friend who was like your maid of honor at your wedding, you know, or, you know, it could be a good friend, but not like the most traceable friend to you. I would also, the ones at Forever Family Foundation, the ones at Windbridge, they had to pass really strong testing to get certified for being honest. So you can go and look up the Forever Family Foundation and find.

Also, Helping Parents Heal is another one that's really good and vets their mediums as well. Yeah, I heard they're great. And, you know, I had good ones that aren't certified anywhere, too. So it's not across the board fact like that first one that blew me away wasn't certified anywhere. And then just say, don't be so withholding and cold like you're not literally in a study. Like there were times I just was so holding back that I think it actually hurt my reading. It can block. Yeah.

But try to say yes or no or be like, you know, that could make sense. Can you go further? Don't just be like, you know, they give a name and you're like, oh, my God, that's my grandma. And she lived here. Don't keep adding on information. Just say, yeah, that's true. Or no, that's not so true. Because I love, you know, they all say, do you understand what I'm saying?

Or am I making sense? You know, that's kind of your cue. and then you say yes or no and that helps but when someone is just really stoic and shut down I think it really can hurt the reading because it's an energetic experience I think what else you would add to your recommendation if you're doing it in person dress neutrally like if you're a yoga teacher don't wear yoga clothes you know doctor don't wear your coat like as neutral as possible yeah and during the reading I think I want to elaborate a little on the like how you give information because it really is a fine line. And sometimes you have to let something

go if they're just like, I'm not getting it. There are times I was just like, because I would score them, especially in the beginning. And I'd be like, well, I'll have to deduct for this. So I would be like, okay, I'll give that piece of information. But I gave what I was like, oh, this is such a significant piece to give. That's not always bad. Like gates opened. Sometimes when I did that, they were like, I'm, you know, I'm just getting an older man. I'm like, oh, this is going to be terrible. They're like not getting relationship. Like, I don't know. And finally, you know, I'm not, I don't remember this specifically, but this is a general, I'd be like, okay, it's my dad. And they're suddenly like, oh my God, thank you. And then just some of the best

readings I've ever had. So don't like go there immediately. But if they're just blocked, it doesn't mean the whole reading is not going to be great. Sometimes they hit an obstacle and you have to let the evidence go and then the evidence pours in. Yeah, that's good advice. And so what I also I think is interesting about your story, speaking of all of this, is that as you're going to these events with all these mediums and hanging out with them, you know, after the Forever Friends event or whatever. Forever Family, yeah. Forever Family, sorry. That's okay. You start doing readings yourself. So tell us about that, how you started, because I think you're, I mean, would you say that now you do mediumship. It took you a while to claim that, but you still. No, not at all. I think

there were very specific situations. They say everybody has these abilities. This is how our brains work. Yeah. And as like a famous quote is like, everyone can sing, but not everyone's Beyonce. And I think there were very specific moments. Something was able to break through and it'd be much easier for it to break through someone who's actually a medium. But I think for reasons that I needed the experience and they were just going to work so hard. Like I only seem able to do it when I'm around other mediums, like a group of people. And this was a life changer. I can tell the first time I did it, I went to the Forever Family Foundation. They normally do grief retreats, but this was the first one I went to. They had a special convention called the Afterlife and

Mediumship Convention. And they had all these different tracks for people who wanted to develop their abilities and then one track for people in grief. So I signed up for in grief way before I really knew them very well. Before the retreat, I ended up volunteering for them. So I, you know, I got so close with the founders. Sadly, the woman passed away, but they became like, I'm so close with the, I mean, I'll say I'm so close with her. And they're like adopted parents to me. They're like two of my favorite people in the world. And so I went to this retreat. I'm like far the most skeptical one. Like I'm acting so socially awkward with the mediums like this one medium, Joe Parada, who's like my best friend now. He like did not like me. He's like she is sent by

a skeptical organization to tear us down or she's a New York Times reporter and she's going to destroy us. And he's like, I do not like her right now. I mean, we think it's hilarious because he's one of my best friends. But I had all my protocols up and I was like desperate. I was like, this has to be true. This weekend's going to be pivotal. Like I'm either going to fall apart and just not know where to pick up the pieces from here or I'm going to get good evidence. And it was it couldn't have been better. And the last night after I'd harassed everyone like all weekend with like every science question there could be was the opportunity for all the people who were attending to develop their mediumship abilities to give readings to the mediums. And jokingly, Fran and

Bob, the founders, were like, Liz, you're going to go give your reading? And I was like, ha ha, All right. Then, I don't know, are you familiar with Lloyd Auerbach? Yeah, I know the name, but... Yeah. He's a stage mentalist magician, a parapsychologist, so he really knows how to research this. And he is, I believe, like president now of Forever Family Foundation, and he also teaches and is on the board at the Ryan Education Center, where I had taken a lot of virtual classes and they have really good science-based classes on these topics, but open minded, you know, they, they think it's true. And I'd taken a class on cold reading with him,

which is like techniques medium used to get fake readings. So I could be aware. I'd taken a class on mediumship and part of it was cold reading, you know, so you can know if a medium's doing cold reading. And so I was like, oh, I'll practice a cold reading. So I get up and I'd like read one mediums book like at this point she was before I came here she was the only one I knew and so I was like walked over to her I was like giving a few facts from her book and then it was just a really weird experience because it was like the things that first that came into my logical mind from her book were stuff that like about losses like that's something I would have done for fun like I was doing silly things at first and then I was like my mind just went blank and I don't know how

long I stood there but I felt like all these waves are moving through me and I'd felt them some that weekend, but I thought they were my brain neurons healing from grief. So then they got so weird. And I cannot say why I did this, but I walked over to this medium I really didn't know named Joe Scheel. And it was like, I just started seeing things, but like I felt them, like I felt all these waves that were going through my whole body suddenly just start like congealing and centering in one spot in my brain. And they were just there and then they would burst and they'd go through there and burst. And I said that to him. I was like, did someone die of like a stroke? And I was like, no, no, no. They keep bursting. An aneurysm? Yes. Then they did that all in my

heart, the same experience. And I said that it was like heart attack. He's like, yes. And I mean, a really successful medium like would not just say, did you lose someone to a heart attack? But for me, I was like, wow. So now I believe them completely when they're having these sensations. And I got a few images in my mind that were accurate. And then I took a class with another medium, Renee Buck, who does like great classes and retreats. And I like the last day of the class, like I was by far the most skeptical and I was like gave the most evidential readings. And I was just crazy. Again, I felt all these waves. I felt like I was moving like on a boat and I felt like waves in certain areas that were giving me information. I can't do this 99%

of the time. But for whatever reason, you have that experience, which I think is really valuable because, you know, especially for you or for anyone who's really trying to debunk things, it's really about proving things to have the experience yourself of what a legitimate medium or psychic experience is probably really helped. Let me ask you this, because to me, this is, I want to know what you think about this. I have some opinions about it. But what role do you now as a griever and as someone who's been really exploring this world for a while now, what role do you think belief and understanding and subscribing to the idea of an afterlife plays in the grief process? For me, and I'm just gonna say one thing, I actually don't use the word

belief, because I think for that, I feel I've come to this based on what was originally a preponderance of evidence. And now I'd say it's beyond a reasonable doubt. And so I'd say at this point, so what role do you think, knowing there is an afterlife? What do you have beyond a reasonable doubt that it's the most logical conclusion based on the evidence I have, which is saying it I immediately stopped taking myself. Yes. Yes. Yeah. So belief, AKA what you just said, what the long way and diatribe in the grieving process. Oh my God. It's the, the most transformative thing. I honestly have no vision for how my life could have moved forward without it so nothing therapy like some of the things that

people like well they still live on in your memory like if that works for you I do not want to step into what anyone else has like there is no right or wrong way for me I don't have a vision of a single other thing in the world that would have made me okay and now this might sound really odd in a way I'm happier than I've ever been because I had more death anxiety and sort of existential dread than I realized. And I just wouldn't let myself think about it because it was too horrible. And it's just like my whole way of existing in the world is significantly happier. The world has so much more to it, like multiple lives, multiple dimensions of consciousness, these fun communications with other dimensions. Like I always liked string theory, but this is like

string theory plus like things to the millionth power and it's just it brings me not only is it the only thing I could imagine that changed my grief it also brings like this obviously I have really bad days and life's still hard the material world's still hard and there's stuff in my life I've been personally struggling with or like trying to build my life to the next level that all stays however there is this thread of joy to every day and hope that there never was well That's beautiful. Yeah, that really is. And, you know, it's also like a big part for me. I feel so grateful. And I think, you know, people would ask me, like, how is it that you're I mean, not that I didn't fall into a ball of mush and barely move for a year after losing my son. But when people look at me now, four years out or even two years out, they would be like, how are you doing as well as you're doing? Not that I'm doing well all the time. And I knew, like, I felt so blessed that I had already discovered, delved into and written Quantum Love, my last book, before Sammy transitioned. Because if I had not really understood and known beyond a reasonable doubt that for me, that his energy, that the energy of which we're all made would remain and understood all of this quantum stuff in the way that I did, I would have not been doing as well as I would ended up doing.

And I would not have been as open to the communications and the connections that I was able to get. And that's why I feel it's so important, like on every healing event or retreat, I always have a really good medium with me. Because to me, once you understand that, even if you aren't getting, I mean, I understand there may be skeptics in the room that don't trust, but what I find for the most part is even if you aren't getting the specific reading, when you see these other evidentiary readings happening and that the person is saying, there's no way you could have known that, right, or whatever, and you're seeing, you start to understand that, oh, they aren't fully gone.

It's a long distance relationship now that I have to learn how to navigate. And of course, it's not nearly the same or as good, but you can stay in connection. And I feel like that's such a huge part of healing. I think that's what you're saying as well. And I know you have a lot of communication with your dad. You have a lot of signs from him. Often people in grief are struggling. You know, they want signs and they're not feeling any signs or they're not feeling the spiritual connection. What would you say to them? They write them down. And this is, I can't believe coming from me. I am literally the least patient person on the planet. Unfortunately, you have to have patience. And sometimes like there's a reason you're not getting one because someone said this

to me early, a few people, because they're doing something better with it. I was like, don't even say that to me. That's so that no. And it turned out to in a big way to be true, like kind of a long story, so I won't go into it. But I was so devastated this medium that no mediums had gotten like the key hobby that my dad has. And it came up later with a medium after we were friends in such a significant way that it took like six years and it was so worth it that there was the weight. So, so you had information six years after your dad, which you don't want to say because. Oh, I can say I could go into it. Yeah. It's in my book. So my, I just didn't know if you were winding down, I'm happy to share it late so we can finish and okay, like a dirty version.

Okay, so my dad has a hobby. I don't share it anywhere. So I call it in my book tennis, maybe it's tennis, maybe it's something else, but it had never come up with a medium in years. And like, even like our best family friend was like, well, if a medium ever said tennis, then I would believe it. And I'm like, yeah, me too. And it was like, however much evidential stuff they were getting I was sad about that yeah and I actually so that medium I mentioned Joe Corretta who didn't like me at first we ended up becoming friends and like I'd asked him early on how sad I was that he wasn't getting it that no one had gotten it that no one I of course didn't tell Joe what it was and he was like oh you know maybe your dad wants to keep it just between the two of you and I was

like seeing signs like I saw the word written in a really random place that like I end up like taking a wrong turn to end up at. Like I was getting signs that are good. I'm just like super skeptical. And this was just the thing. It just super bothered me like constantly that no one had gotten this. So Joe and I become like better friends. And we took a period of our lives where we were doing like experiments together. He was learning the science and we were doing like these meditations and experiments together. And he was teaching me aspects of like mediumship. And And I like earlier that day was somewhere and I was like telling my dad, like I saw a sign related to what I call tennis. And I was like, dad, send like, I don't care if you think this is between

us. I'm so sick of it. You have to tell Joe. That night we're doing a meditation and Joe had asked me a few questions to try to figure out like why I hadn't gotten it. Like, is it super obscure? There's a few things why no one had gotten it. And I, of course, totally lied to misdirect what it would be about. But he didn't realize for some reason he was like, yeah, I don't know why I didn't realize you were lying. Of course you'd lie. So I like gave all this false information when he was asking questions about it. And so he's doing the meditations and like, I felt my dad there and he suddenly felt like my dad there and suddenly tennis like stuff dropped in front of his face. And he asked me, he's like, no, that can't, he's like, okay. Cause he's like, what's the big sign?

And he saw that. And he's like, that can't be it. Cause that doesn't match up with the stuff Liz said so then he asks after he's like I'm sure this isn't it I just started hysterically crying and he's like oh my god he's like yeah of course you lied then there was this whole other component that couldn't have happened if the medium had gotten it the next day I'm standing waiting for my subway and I'm like oh I should text Joe that was so amazing he got the sign but I'm like way over thinking it I mean in a weird way like he's my good friend he's gay like I'm not gonna over think like texting. It's not like, you know, it's like the way you ever think like after a second date, do I text him now? It was weird. And I was like overly arguing with myself in my head. Oh,

why would I text him again? We're going to talk later on and on in my mind, both dialogues. So finally I just text him. That was so amazing. You got the sign. He texts me back. Oh my God, photo of a tennis racket. He said he was in a store, saw one and said, okay, Liz's dad, if that was really you, I want Liz to text me. And the next like 10 minutes, Otherwise, I'll never tell her this. And he turns on his phone and like his timer for 10 minutes. Two minutes later, I text him. So that little argument in my head was like my dad being like, text Joe. And I was like, why would I text Joe? Text Joe. Why? That's weird. Yeah. And I love that because they do drop thoughts in. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love

that story. And I think the point in terms of answering the question I asked is that, I mean, hopefully it won't take six years, but sometimes the specific sign you want may take longer than you think and everything in divine timing. And I think also I always say to people to be open, like I know it's anti-skeptic to say this, but I do think when you acknowledge the signs that you're asking for when they show up, or even if something shows up that you think is a sign, and I'm not talking about giving credit to mediums, I mean within yourself, when you say, yes, thank you, even if they didn't send that sign. They're like, oh, she thinks this is me. I'll send more of it. And if

they did send it, they're like, oh, great. She gets it. I'll send more of it. If you don't acknowledge it and they're like, no, that's not real. They're like, oh, well, she doesn't get it. I'll have to move on and find something else. So I do think it helps to encourage. But I don't mind this criticism. I think it's both. And I think there's something, too, because I don't have time for me to go into all my signs. But when I got the strong ones, because I'd gotten other really strong ones before then I would get like weird thoughts in my head not weird do something crazy but like text joe something that just I almost felt I was overthinking one I was like oh like a walk this way and it was like I just started like slowly meandering and walked

like sort of out of the way in a way I wouldn't stopped and stared at this thing and it turned out I had my dad's name on it it's just like those little things yeah pay attention pay attention And bottom line, and I think if you read her books, you'll see the journey unpacked. I think it's really beautiful to have someone like you who really is not a believer, almost didn't want it to believe, but also was ready not to believe and was fighting it every step of the way that you believe. Now, don't just believe you have evidence, blah, blah, blah, whatever that statement is.

My long two-hour diatribe. I can't even repeat it. But basically the equivalent of knowing beyond a reasonable doubt that it is likely true due to the scientific evidence, but basically that doubt has been alleviated. And I think that's a really beautiful part of the journey. Thank you, or a big part of everyone's journey. We're so grateful for all the work that you've done and continue to do. And if you, if people want to find you, I'll put everything in the show notes, guys, on our two books and the links, but tell us where people can find you if they want to explore what you're up to more. So you can find my books, podcasts, and I host some private salons, science and spirituality

salons, and you can find all that on my website, wtfjusthappened.net. And you can link to my Instagram. That's probably the place I'm most active on social media. And it's the same thing? You can find it on my website, but it's WTF underscore just underscore happened underscore. WTF just happened was already taken. And underscore is between every word. Yeah, yeah.

Beautiful. Thank you so much, Liz. Thank you so much. I so appreciate it. That I'm crazy for your love Wrote me a prescription But there's no cure for a cry