This Paranormal Life - #336 The Sleeping Mystic - Edgar Cayce

Episode Date: October 11, 2023

A long time ago, in a place far away, a boy was born with special and unusual abilities. No, this was not a boy called Anakin on the planet Tatooine; he was Edgar Cayce from Kentucky, USA. But his abilities were as astonishing as if he was blessed with the Force - he could heal the sick and predict the future. People would travel from far and wide to experience his talents and he became one of the most famous clairvoyants in history. But as time as past, questions are now being asked about the mystics of old - was he a miracle healer or a conman? Time for investigators Kit and Rory to find out.LIVE TOUR - https://www.thisparanormallife.com/tourFollow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTubeJoin our Secret Society Facebook CommunitySupport us on Patreon.com/ThisParanormalLife to get access to weekly bonus episodes!Buy Official TPL Merch! - thisparanormallife.com/storeIntro music by www.purple-planet.comResearch by Amy GrisdaleEdited by Philip Shacklady Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Do ghosts sleep? What if my hair starts growing down into my head instead of out of my scalp? Jesus! Answers to these questions and more on this Paranormal Life! Sorry, I kind of got thrown there. It's scary, isn't it? You were in a dark place when you wrote that one that's that's a thought that even by saying it aloud there's people on our way on their way to the house right now to arrest you

i just blurted it out one night 1 a.m glass of whiskey complete darkness staring into an open fire water hair started growing into my head. That is terrifying. Really a terrifying thought. Welcome to this. Welcome to this Paranormal Life. This is the weekly comedy podcast, not horror podcast, where every Tuesday we investigate a different paranormal tale, deciding by the end of the episode whether it's truly paranormal or not. You're joined by me, Kit Greer-Malvena, and this guy, Rory Powers. How are you doing today, Rory? Doing pretty good. On today's episode, we're going to be talking about what if your teeth started growing into your face?

Now you're talking, bud. I think that's what happens to rats, though, isn't it? Sorry. What are you talking about? You know the way rats... Sorry. What are you talking about? You know the way, rats. You're someone right now who's trying to pass off a fact

as if you haven't meticulously researched it before. You're like, I think actually, now that I think about it, I believe it's rats where their teeth grow inside their skull. It sounds like you already know that it is. Is it rats that the teeth grow at a rate of 0.5 millimeters per week? In my research, in research that I've read, that I haven't performed myself in the basement, I've heard that their teeth grow into the skull.

You know how many rats you can fit in a barrel? Is that why there's so much cheese in your fridge? It is top to ceiling, different types of cheese. Classified. I think that, not to get off topic, I think that the thing is why rats gnaw things is so that their teeth don't, I think that, not to get off topic, I think that the thing is why rats gnaw things is so that their teeth don't,

I think if they can't gnaw, I think the teeth start growing weird. What, really? How you doing, bud? How you doing? Yeah, you're just, you're asking and saying so many weird things

it's hard to kind of pretend like nothing is, nothing weird is going on. That's why they gnaw? Maybe today's case has put my head into a dark place. I don't know. It's almost as if my kind of dark dreams or nightmares at night are spilling over into the daytime,

and I just can't keep these questions inside. I don't blame you. Creatures all across the world, animals, they're paranormal beings, even the regular ones. I saw a video the other day where someone was explaining that everyone knows caterpillars and everyone knows that they become butterflies when they go into their cocoon did you know there's a step in between you know there's a step in between that's actually kind of important go on they don't just like

sprout little wings out of their worm body they dissolve into goo right and they essentially become a sentient puddle and then that forms into a butterfly jesus but they vaguely sounds familiar they've tested it before and when they become a butterfly they have the same memories as the caterpillar what do you mean the same memories as the caterpillar. What do you mean the same memories? Come on, man. Somehow this goo remembers. It holds memories. A butterfly was like, I know who shot JFK. God damn it. That's crazy. I think it's something sad.

Like they electrified the caterpillar and then also electrified the butterfly. And they both hated it. I don't know if that's memory. That's just instinct, isn't it? I know what you mean, though. It's like they trained one to eat jammy dodgers and then it became a butterfly and it still loved jammy dodgers.

Right. Or like they beat up the caterpillar and then when it became a butterfly, they like cocked a fist back and it flinched. Yeah. You know, so it's like all the instincts. These are all examples of the same thing, just abuse. But that is a legitimately fascinating fact, though.

It really is. You know, so on this podcast, yes, we do tell you a lot of stories that turn out to be fiction. But don't say that we don't come at you with some scientific facts as well. Double check it, though. Double check it before you tell your friends and your peers at a party, because it might be nonsense. I believe it is true, but it might be nonsense. Memory goo. I think I was sentient goo after the end of our 2022 UK live tour. That's what I classified as, as a human being. You wish you could forget some memories. I'm not going to get sidetracked but

i mentioned my dreams i had a dream the other night i was a bowling ball stop stop right there we don't have time we don't have time to get into it we do not have time to get into it we really don't because you're going five minutes now. We haven't even started today's episode. But I do have some follow-up questions that I need to understand. Who threw you and what were the pins? I only really remember being in the bit where you come out of the machine and someone picks you up. I don't have that. It wasn't like a highly vivid.

I'm trying to get some meaning from it. Was it your father that picked you up and he bowled you at, you know? There actually is some pretty strong Freudian metaphors about being picked, right? Because there's lots of bowling balls. That's the idea. Yeah, I guess. I feel like you're trying to twist this dream into something nice. I'm not.

Like you were selected. I'm not. Okay. I'm not. I think it was a borderline anxiety dream. I'm just honest. I'm just telling you what happened. Okay. Okay. I'm not. I think it was a borderline anxiety dream. I'm just honest. I'm just telling you what happened. Okay.

Okay. Sometimes I just close my eyes and see pins is all. We are not going to get, that's the true story, we're not going to get derailed into more dream talk. No one likes listening to other people talk about their dreams, especially when they were bowling balls. In them, we have a brand new paranormal case. Sorry, did it just...

To get to the bottom. Did it feel like you were yourself or you were a bowling ball? Just a sentient bowling ball. It's actually similar to the idea of being sentient goo or a caterpillar. It's like I was just awake. And when he bowled you,

were you just like... It's kind of flying down the alley? Yeah. I don't know what you want me to say, man. I, I shouldn't have brought it up. Obviously.

I don't have that much to say. You can't bring it up at the start of the podcast and then be like, I don't want to talk about it. Some of the, some of the podcast is a bit, I don't mind talking about it, but I just don't have that much to say because it's not a bit. That's my real life.

Such a real life. You need to understand you being a bowling ball is not real. Sometimes I think this is the dream and not a bit. It's my real life. It's not your real life. You need to understand, you being a bowling ball is not real. Sometimes I think this is the dream and being a ball was the real bit. We have a new case to get into and we're going to do just that after a couple of words from today's sponsors with a reminder

that every episode of This Paranormal Life is available ad-free in bowling form at patreon.com forward slash this paranormal life alright we're about to you gotta stop laughing I'm sorry let's go

we're taking it back to a time before bowling the 3rd of March 1877 whoa 1877 a little! 1877. A little baby is born to a poor family in rural Kentucky, only 12 years after the Civil War. Little Edgar Cayce was special from a young age. Even as a child, he saw the ghost of his deceased grandfather. Whoa. I guess maybe if you're seeing ghosts at that age,

you don't even know you're not supposed to be seeing ghosts. Exactly. That's what I was thinking. That's genuinely kind of scary. Growing up in the time period he did, he became a devout Christian by the age of 10 and loved nothing more than to grab his Bible and crack it out in the middle of the woods.

Oh. I do need to see some evidence of that because I think, to be fair, that's what I would have told my parents I was doing if, in fact, I was breaking the law or taking drugs. My parents were like, oh, Kit, where are you going? Are you going out to meet some friends?

I'm like, yeah, we're going to crack open the Bible in the woods and read each other Gospels. We're going to crack open a couple of Bibles and chug it down. A few Bible lights. Billy had so many Bibles last time we went out, he was sick in his own hands. He was quietly reading the book of Deuteronomy when suddenly, out of nowhere, a woman appeared before him. She had beautiful, delicate looking wings, and she hovered above him like a fairy. Oh hell yeah. Tell me child, what is your heart's deepest desire?

Did she stutter like that or was that you making a mistake? Because I feel like angels You're starting to look like ten pins, mother f***er. How would you like to be split? Because I never got a strike. I couldn't in the dream all night. I didn't get a strike.

Okay. He thought for a second, then answered. To help people, especially sick little kids. She smiled. As you wish, especially sick little kids. As you wish, so it shall be. And with that, she was gone.

Little Edgar wasn't scared, just a little confused. On account of, I don't think there were fairy women in the book of Deuteronomy. Wait, so she turned up, asked what he wished for, he told her, and it's granted now? I guess. I would be so, if this was me, I would be so pissed off

because if a fairy turns up, the assumption is, the unspoken understanding is, there's going to be three wishes. This is you on the complaints line to the fairy bureau. Everyone knows how it works. Yeah.

And of course, I'm going to start off with the good one because you want people to think you're a nice person. So you're like, well, obviously, world peace. Oh, oh, of course. Harumph. Yes. Let the trumpets of peace. The fairy woman, her eyes are rolling. She's like, yeah.

And oh, i have two more i guess an xbox then as well if i have more wishes because world peace already that that was obviously i had to pick that one so if the world is sorted and it is yeah then now that it's done yes giant penis something i don't need but i feel like if the wish is here i'm gonna take it giant penis in an xbox please your highness you don't need, but I feel like if the wish is here, I'm going to take it. Giant penis in an Xbox, please, your highness. You don't need, but you don't have. Maybe I want a second.

Maybe I want two of them. Okay? Maybe I want to downsize because it's a little uncomfortable currently when I wear tight jeans. There's something there. An angel's like, you have to stop. No one's ever said the word penis to an angel before it turns out we don't like it i didn't know i didn't like that but i

don't there's something funny about being like it's like yeah for sure like world peace and then with my other wishes and the fairy's like what a kind soul can i also interest you in the wish of curing hunger for the poor? And you're like, yeah, for sure, because... I thought that kind of got rolled up in peace. Yeah, because they're still hungry, even though it's peaceful. She's like, mm-hmm, that's right. And what about homes for the homeless? You're like, all right, you need to can it.

You need to can it. These are my wishes. These are my wishes. Surely you can grant these wishes anytime you like. Yeah, she gets you to go for the feed all the hungry. And you're like, okay, well, I still got one more wish left. And she's like, they're probably going to want to drink with that. She's like, oh, for f*** sake.

Give them all a soda. Give them all a soda, goddammit. What is this? What is this? You turn up. You say I've got wishes. You tell me the wishes that I need to make. It is unexpected. The fairy element is unexpected and it's pretty interesting.

It goes to show that the paranormal is not necessarily what we anticipate. Because he grew up in this time, he's expecting the world of the Bible to be exactly kind of the world he sees around him. But that's not what happened. The first kind of crazy experience he had. Yeah. A f***ing fairy. As I say, Edgar was okay with it, just a little confused. But it was almost dinner time, so he set off home with his Bible tucked under his arm. The family gathered around the table to eat, but not everyone was too happy. Edgar, your mother and I got a letter from the school today. Your performance is sorely lacking, especially in spelling. You've always got your nose in that Bible. Surely you could spell? Do it now. Spell the word necessary.

N-E-S? S? No, you simpleton! And because it was 1877, his parents smacked him upside the head. As Edgar made his way to bed, his head pounded and his ears were ringing, but through the fuzz he heard a voice. It was the winged woman from the woods, somehow speaking inside his brain. Take your school book, rest your head upon it, and go to sleep. If I didn't know any better, I would think Edgar was insane.

Yeah. Hearing the voices of a forest wood woman. Yeah, how hard they hit him. He didn't understand where the words came from. But when a ghost from the future talks inside your head, you listen. And he decided to obey them. This is a tough situation to be in because listeners of the podcast

might not know that I myself am quite dyslexic. And, you know, in today's modern society, that's approached a very different way. And there's ways that people can help you and, you know, make people understand your difficulties.

In the 1700s 1800s they would have beat the shit out of me i would have been called the town donkey brained boy right and they would have kind of made me just work in a field uh so i'm glad that we've come a long way from just hitting your child until he sees angels. That's not saying hit him until he dies. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. Yeah. Ideally, he sees them before the point of death. Yes. Yeah.

It's always fascinating to think, isn't it? What will be the things that we do today that in the future they can't believe we used to do? Because we look back on kids being hit in school and going, that is crazy. Imagine a kid can't spell a word and so you smack him. That's a crazy thing. That's a really good point. I don't know.

Maybe probably vaping. People will be like, that actually was way worse than we thought. We think that's bad now, though, is the thing. That's true. Maybe like parkour, free running would be like, I can't believe we just let teenagers do backflips

off skyscrapers. Yeah. Although it's pretty cool. Okay. That's never going to not be cool. I mean, I have nothing against it, but surely

like boxing and MMA, that's got to be up there in terms of the not aging gracefully in kind of the eyes of history right and I know fighting is very ancient

but I don't know can we really be a species that ventures into the galaxy you know sets up colonies

on Mars and at the same time a guy with cauliflower ear is dislocating another Serbian guy's arm. Yeah, I don't really look fondly upon it now. So at least I know I'm on the right side of history with that one. But you're absolutely right, Rory.

Thank God. Thank God you were brought up in a different time. And now it's only me that smacks you whenever you get a fact on the podcast. True. Maybe gym class at school. That's something that's probably not going to age well because I think it's already changed a lot since we were kids. But there were definitely times where they would just surprise you

with a fitness test that was essentially, let's see who's the fattest. It was a Squid Games-esque kind of playground laid out to annihilate the fatties from the class. And as a fatty, I didn't appreciate it. It's quite funny you say that. I was listening to a podcast yesterday and they were talking about fitness tests

and that did really unlock some kind of core memories. I was like that there's something that doesn't yeah seem pc about it i suppose because we now live in an age of like body positivity um and where people were kind of being encouraged to like you know just never think about weight at all really just focus on people's health rather than yeah but yeah but but back then it was like it was like we are going to expel you if you can't get from if you can't get from point a to point b before the the cd beeps yeah we haven't i think we've maybe talked about it once on the podcast before but the beep i don't know if that was a thing that was in test us schools yeah uh it was essentially something

they did here in the UK, at least, where one day they would never tell you when it was going to happen because you weren't allowed to prepare for some reason. You would just get to class and like people would be crying and like consoling each other. And you're like, well, what's going on? You work your way through the crowd. You find your friend Thomas and you're like Thomas surely it cannot be today and he's like I'm afraid so brother we've been summoned for the beep yeah as if it's the f***ing tri-wizard tournament from Harry Potter where where it's a weird like fun little secondary school game but actually half of them die yeah and they would make you line up on one side of a hall

when you hear the beep you run to the other side of a hall. When you hear the beep, you run to the other side of the hall. Right. And then you have enough time to recover till you hear the beep again and you have to go to the other side of the hall. And the beep is basically incrementally getting faster. Faster and faster and faster until the beep is happening very quickly. And if you didn't make it to the end, you're eliminated until it's only, And if you didn't make it to the end, you're eliminated until it's only, let's face it, the tallest and hottest kids in class competing against each other. It was really frustrating. I think it was probably something they don't or shouldn't do anymore.

It's funny you say that. It was there was something traumatizing about all that stuff. Like, I just remember that with such dread was like going to like swimming class and having to like, yeah, race like lengths and stuff and do tests. I don't know why it felt so, even though we were all shit at it, it felt humiliating.

Yeah. I don't know why. It was super embarrassing. So hopefully that's treated in a bit of a different way. We're getting distracted to get back to our story. Edgar had been told

to rest his head upon his school book and go to sleep. That night, he slept on a hardback book instead of his pillow. And the next morning, when he woke up, he knew the contents of the pages so well he could recite the entire book from memory. Wow. From then on, he slept on a different book every night. Holy shit. He would awaken to a brain full of fresh knowledge. book every night. Holy shit. He would awaken to a brain full of fresh knowledge. And by the end of the school year, he was performing at such a high level he had to be put with the older and advanced

students. But he developed other abilities too. He began to see ghosts everywhere, not just of his grandfather. His parents were concerned because they hadn't told Edgar. But Grandpappy had displayed some supernatural abilities of his own while he was alive. Okay. So this child is claiming, allegedly, to have some supernatural abilities and maybe that is why he could even see that fairy thing in the start. But the fact that that thing is getting involved is also opening up more powers to him like being able to sleep on books and to obtain their knowledge it's a good point yeah i actually haven't thought about the kind of order of these events but yeah i would kind of see it as

as you say he has a propensity he has the ability to see these things like this fairy and then it's almost as if the fairy is like not bestowing powers but like almost like pointing him in the right direction being like hey you're having trouble at school you're you're special so you don't need to study you just need to put your head on a book yeah which is weird because i was called special but i got held back here how's he getting moved forward we don't have time for that. Unfortunately for Edgar, it was around this time that he had a terrible accident at school. He and the other boys were presumably playing 1v1 basketball when Edgar got his ankles snapped, not literally, and damaged his spine.

Oh, Jesus. It was so bad that he was partially paralyzed. His mother was inconsolable. Wait, hold on. He got injured so bad in the playground, he was paralyzed? Yes. Oh, my God. That's the beep right there.

That mother f***er called up for the beep. Definitely. He tried so hard to sprint. He scorpioned and snapped his back in half. Oh my God. His mother was inconsolable and would not leave her young son's bedside silently crying. But just then, Edgar started talking. Oh, 50 milliliters milk, 25 grams butter, 100 grams breadcrumbs, 50 grams walnuts. He's lost it. We need to put him down.

Put him out of his misery. He wasn't starting a conversation. He was listing ingredients. Bake 15 minutes at 180 till golden brown. Still asleep, he finished his recipe and said, She was willing to try anything, so hurried to the kitchen to make Edgar his magical elixir. This is the equivalent of any time I was sick as a kid,

and I was like, oh, maybe some ice cream would help my tummy. Oh, some Fortnite, I think, would distract me from the sickness. I've told this story before, but, you know, me and my friends, it's not a laughing matter. Me and my friends were all struck with a terrible, terrible, quick and unforgiving bout of an illness known as bungee-itis when Halo 2 dropped for Xbox. I believe you once referred to it as Spartan fever. Spartan fever. The Halo 2 video game long awaited and pre-ordered, of course, by me and all my friends

dropped and was delivered to our houses that day, which was a school day. And we all developed terrible coughs that morning. Yeah, it must have been something in the box. Oh, it's just all of a sudden. I was thinking that the other day, you know, I've been sick recently, thanks to my toddler. And it is a little bit pathetic,

but I kind of have this now psychological connection between being sick and like you say, treats you would have got when you were sick and to this day I still buy Sprite or 7-Up when I'm sick wow just as like a little like I think my you know but back in the day I don't know just Irish mammies or old mammies but their whole thing do you remember like flat coke yeah that was like the cure to cancer flat coke yeah I remember being really weirded out by that because i think when i was really sick and had a you know i was almost delirious from a fever

and my mom was like oh you know what you need is just it's just a flat coke and my mom was a nurse for 60 years i was like you of all people should know what I need is medicine. Yes, lots of medicine and possibly bed rest and water. I was on my knees begging for a drop of water. And she was like, no, no, give it 45 minutes and this DC will have cooled down a little. Please, mom, no. Which I'm sure everyone has experienced this. But for anyone who hasn't experienced this,

this is literally what it sounds like. Buying Coke, Coca-Cola, opening the bottle, and just letting the air, just letting all the bubbles out. Cut to me on my deathbed. My mother's like, oh, don't worry, I'm bringing the doctor up. And I'm like, is it Pepper? Is it Dr. Pepper? He is flat, yes.

I'm cold for the doctor uh but you know say what i will i don't know i i think realistically because now i've got a kid i know that what i do when she's sick is i feel bad for her and give her whatever she wants right so she gets to have a little bit of ice cream or whatever. So maybe I'm creating those new connections that she will want to have toffee popcorn or something every time she's sick. Yeah. I mean, for us, I think we were probably not getting medicine

because most of the time we were faking it. So that's probably why. But back to Edgar's elixir. Sure enough, when he drank the concoction, his body was fully restored. It was a miracle, and he had discovered his gift for healing that the fairy promised him.

What? You know, he said he wanted to help the kids, even the sick ones. Oh. He was able to help himself, too. This is only really strange because I believe it was last week we did a case on a guy who discovered the secret to

an elixir that would grant him eternal life uh his was done through alchemy you know mixing together metals and potions and rituals this mother is just using milk and eggs he made a protein shake that brought him back he was just malnourished He asked mother for a huel to get back on his feet. His spine stopped working, so he drank a Soylent and then he was fine. He just needed more than 20 calories a day. We've got the beginnings of an interesting paranormal career here as a potentially gifted, potentially paranormal child with a connection to the other side. One that we're going to

explore as he clearly goes on to do great things. After a couple words from today's sponsors. Edgar would grow up and get married as well. At which point his wife convinced him to start sharing his gift with the world.

What is the gift? He can heal kids or he can see ghosts? I guess they're both pretty good. All the above. He began to host readings, two of them per day, with the aim to heal as many sick and injured people as possible. People came to him with all sorts of problems.

His big break was in 1902, when a five-year-old girl was brought before him. Her parents had taken her to every doctor in the area and they all told her the same thing. She had a, quote, fatal brain condition and wasn't expected to live for very much longer. Edgar gave the girl a spinal adjustment and she went on to live a long and prosperous life. Whoa, not paranormal. I'm guessing like this was one of those like internet chiropractors. You ever see those like TikTok chiropractors? Just snapping people back into place.

Yeah. He could diagnose and heal just about anything. The person didn't even need to be in the same room. He could do this shit remotely. What? He was able to relieve the back pain of a grizzled sea captain a thousand miles away.

Is it always back pain? Is it always spine stuff? No, actually. Okay. But that is funny. Rory, we have seen healers a little bit like this. Yes. Over the years. What do you a little bit like this. Yes.

Over the years. What do you make of people like this? People that have a gift, supposedly, for diagnosing and healing? Always a little skeptical of it, as you should be with any kind of alternative medicine. Because in the past, the majority of cases, they turn out to be con men. They turn out to be snake oil salesmen. Well, I'm throwing the C word around. I'm throwing it around.

You know, I don't know the full context of how this little whippersnapper is doing it, but is there a point in this story where he's going to start charging people for these appointments? I don't know. Well, you know, one would need to charge if this is your job.

Would it be so... I'm just looking at the script here. Would it be so bad if he were to start charging people? I think one of the cases that jumped to mind is a case we investigated not too long ago

about an individual called Dr. Baker who ran the Crescent Hotel. He, at one point, the hotel was a hospital where he claimed he had the cure to cancer. And I think it became very apparent that he didn't.

He didn't. And the only reason that people weren't returning from the hospital to tell everyone he didn't have the cure is because not many people left the hospital. And if they did leave, it was down a slide they reserved for dead people, which was straight into a lorry, I think. Right. I think if any of the nurses were like,

doctor, is it smart to let the patients go? The doctor's like, they won't get far, trust me. If anything, I've made it worse. So he's not going to be able to tell many people. It'd be a miracle if he survives the carriage ride home. So I think with that in mind, I'm always a little skepticalceptical of quote-unquote healers.

Well, people may have been sceptical back then too, but many more were intrigued and interested in procuring Edgar's powers for themselves. Word spread like wildfire, and he was suddenly in high demand. Letters were pouring in, begging for help with every condition

under the sun. We're all probably wondering how these sessions went. That's what I'm going to tell you right now. Here's how it would go. Someone would come to his office for an appointment, a room that contained an armchair and a couch. Normally, therapists say to their patient, please lie down on the kind of Freud-style therapist couch, and then they'll sit there and take notes and ask questions. Not in Edgar's office. Edgar said they could sit in the armchair, and then he lay down on the sofa and go to sleep.

Okay. That's when he would begin the reading, giving the customer all the answers to their problems from the dream world. Wow. Okay, forget it. Back in. This is cool. He said he was able to tap into a universal consciousness of time and space.

He could answer any question, not just in regard to healings. As long as the answer was milk or eggs. What's the recipe for pancakes? 50 grams of flour, 100 mil milk. They're like, please help me. My wife is going to leave

and take the kids. What should I do? 100 milligrams milk. Two dozen eggs. Milligrams as well. Such a tiny quantity. So before long, people were asking him to predict the future too and he earned the nickname the sleeping prophet wow this is where it gets interesting

for us right because uh a lot of these claims quite difficult to prove uh when people say they're healers that's part of why as you, con men and healers are so prolific and successful is because, well, healing's a lot of psychology and stuff, isn't it? And we've all seen those videos of people who are on crutches and then they get healed and then they throw the crutches down and run out of the church. And it's like, okay, are they cured forever or do they just feel really good in that moment?

It's tough. It's tough. Yeah, there's a lot of psychology. You know, think about the placebo effect. If someone is convinced and believes so hard that they are healed, that will change them physically. At least, now that he's got into predicting the future, this is great. We can look at some of his predictions and see whether they were any good or not. Good point.

Well, here are just some of the things he predicted. Six months before the financial crash of 1931, he warned his investor friends to sell their stocks and get out of the game. Those that didn't heed his warnings all ended up broke. After the crash, he proclaimed the economy would recover two years in the future. And March 1933, it did Okay, I'm worried that he has investor friends Because I feel like a man of the people performing miracles on the poor Shouldn't also have the phone number of all the guys at Wall Street

He predicted that Hitler would come to power And in the August of that year, 1934, he was voted into German parliament. He also said that he would rise to an immense height and would have to be fought in a war. He allegedly predicted that FDR and JFK would be assassinated. He foretold the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the events of the Cold War, and extreme weather events like El Nino.

Maybe most worryingly, he also did predict the borderline end of the world. Yikes. In 1936, he had a catastrophic vision of a shift in the Earth's magnetic poles causing two massive volcanic eruptions of Mount Pele and Mount Etna. He said much of the Earth will be swallowed by water, that Atlantis will rise again, and that all that will be left of the UK will be two small islands, Birmingham and London. Wow, why is he focusing on the UK? Isn't he in Kentucky? And lastly, he said, you're gonna want to be in New Zealand when all this kicks off.

I'm personally really worried about this one, Rory. Mostly because when he said this is going to happen is close. Really close. Uh-oh. 1998. Wait, that's when it's going to happen? 1998 has, of course, already passed. Yeah.

Maybe he just got the date wrong. I don't know. But what I do know is he said this was going to be caused by the Earth's magnetic field flipping or shifting. Right. I don't know if you know anything about this, but that is actually about to happen. When?

Let me find out. Basically, what this means is, you know the way when you point a compass and it says north and it points to magnetic north, which is a little bit different to the true north that we talk about on maps and stuff, and then south is magnetic south on a compass. Basically, those are going to flip at some point. And the Earth's magnetic poles have been flipping

for the last 20 million years. Every 200,000 to 300,000 years, it flips. This sounds like, I think this is basically the plot to like the Tomb Raider movies or something. Right. It's some kind of global catastrophe. So everything is reversed. Lies are truth. No.

Good is evil. Pretty much just north is south. That's kind of the only thing that flips. Cats chase dogs now. No, no, no, no, no. It's only the compass. Hamburgers eat people. This is so f***ed.

When is this happening? I have to be prepared. This is the worrying bit. We're about 300,000 years overdue of flipping. It could happen any second. Right. One side of this pancake is cooked we are ready to be flipped any second now in lots of respects like i say life will not change but it is a massive shift that could cause some changes some scientists think that it actually could be quite significant.

For example, they said it could cause solar winds to punch holes in the ozone layer, destroying power grids, and one scientist said the aurora borealis would be every night, everywhere on Earth. That sounds sick, actually. I'm into that one. It's kind of like Y2K, you know,

turning into the year 2000. Most people believed everything was going to be fine, but there were very few people that were like, we kind of don't know if it'll be fine until it happens. The worst case scenario, there will be airplanes dropping out of the sky.

Entire power grids will shut down because we're incapable of registering this change of information. Turned out, I think it was almost entirely fine. It was. And I don't know if that was due to a lot of effort on the part of engineering, because there was a big rush, right, to fix it all and make sure it was okay. So I don't know if it was nothing or whether catastrophe was averted by actually smart people.

I don't know. Who knows? If we're heading into this flip and all of a sudden people start selling night glasses, which are sunglasses you have to wear at night. I just don't think. Because the aurora borealis is so bright. Okay. It's like the sun in the night sky. Then we should, we might have to, we might have to think about the possibilities of this actually happening. So, like most people's future predictions we cover

in this Paranormal Life, needless to say, that bag there was a mixed bag of predictions. We know that they can be hard to prove, but allegedly he did make a lot of people rich with his predictions. Some people came to him with questions

asking where they should try and strike oil. Right. What were like big risky bets they should place. I feel like he's getting a little far away from the original goal to heal sick children. Now he's letting oil tycoons know where to drill. This seems like a misuse of the ability to give to children.

There's only so many sick children in the world, Rory, you know. There's more. There's more that haven't been healed yet. Well, Rory, you're being a little critical of Edgar, which I think is fair and warranted and healthy

that we should come to any purported medium, psychic psychic kind of gifted individual person who could communicate with the other side we should approach them all with caution like that and you wouldn't be alone because one high profile critic is our own researcher amy great while putting together this case she uh borderline insisted that I now, as we sort of reach the end of our tale about Edgar, kind of take you on what she calls a debunk-a-thon. Oh, boy.

Of just some of the little problems she has with the story. But then maybe at that point point like on every episode of this paranormal life we can try and balance that all in our heads with the story we've heard and with some of the criticism and see where you come down today okay i'm ready you know where this whole story began was of course little edgar seeing a fairy in the forest. What if he didn't? Because kids lie. Yeah, that's a very valid conclusion to make. He got his start as a kind of brilliant child, a gifted individual,

with this technique of sleeping on top of books and absorbing by osmosis their contents. Well, we do know, to play devil's avocado, that there are kind of elaborate memorization techniques, aren't there? Memory palaces, things like that, ways of learning massive amounts of information. But if you're kind of a smart person, you could do, and it would seem pretty paranormal in the 1870s. Yeah. Yeah, I do remember studying for exams at school. And I remember that being something that I kind of figured out, which was if I studied something essentially right before bed, like right before bed, I would remember it better than if I studied it like earlier in the day. Really?

Yeah. So if I was learning like whatever French vocab or Spanish or something like that, I was trying to memorize words and the meanings and pronunciation. If I did it right before bed, it's almost like that would be the last thought I had and that would kind of marinate in my brain until the morning when it was like fully cooked. You know, I was like slow roasting knowledge. Probably for you, because you might've had normal dreams,

but when you're a bowling ball for seven to eight hours a night, there is no room for f***ing Spanish vocab. There is no biblioteca. There is no playa. Kit's closing his eyes at night just being like, you know, donde esta tu biblioteca? Donde esta tu biblioteca?

The world around him is fading. Next thing he knows, someone's shoving three fingers inside of him and throwing him down an alley. Not again! Please tell me you're at least French. That's interesting and true, though, that there are weird techniques. I've come across that myself. Mnemonic devices, spaced repetition, learning.

This is all really real stuff. Songs. That's why you can remember lyrics to songs word for word. That's why you can remember every lyric to My Chemical Romance's

first album but you can't remember the periodic table. Very true. If the periodic table had been the lyrics to a sick emo

punk rock band in the early 2000s I'd know that shit off by heart yeah if the periodic table was on the 2008 warp tour i would have passed chemistry i'm pretty sure someone should just do a cover where it's all about it's all about the the periodic table and all the different elements you know it definitely exists i, this is why you know all 151 original first generation Pokemon. Because of the Pokérap. Yeah. Good point. Great point. So we need to do that for the kids of today. Potassium, magnesium, selenium, and all the other elements. I don't know all the rest. What were the ones you said?

Potassium, magnesium, selenium. It's such weird elements for you to think of. I will never, never forget a kid in our secondary school chemistry class. The teacher going, you know, and actually diamond is pretty much the hardest material known to man that's why it's got so many amazing industrial uses and one kid putting his hand up it's like exchange studios english and i'm going sir what about adamantium and everyone would have to be like i don't think that's real yeah for those who don't know adamantium is a fictional metal

from the Marvel Cinematic Universe wait no adamantium is that DCU? that's Wolverine isn't it? it's Wolverine Wolverine's bones oh my gosh almost made a big blunder there

so embarrassing we need to edit that out we came back to our potential debunkathon sure sorry the next step in our journey was that he was healed by his own magic potion. What if the little shit was just pretending to be sick? Yeah, because the magic potion that cured him were the ingredients to cookies. So, as I said, I've pulled that stunt before.

Right? It's the oldest trick in the book. Yeah. Saying the thing that will make you better is ice cream. And look, he got into the healing game. Maybe some of the healings were coincidental. Maybe he really did help some of these people. What I do know

is he did also get arrested, along with his wife, for calling himself a doctor when he had no medical license. This is the problem. But do you need a medical license if you're a paranormal gifted individual? Yes. Okay.

And if you are paranormally gifted, you don't call yourself a doctor. Jesus wasn't performing miracles and he was like, my name is actually Dr. Jesus. And it costs a hundred bucks a pop to touch my robes. He kept it pretty chill and pretty humble. He at no point used his powers from God to tell people where to drill for oil. He kind of was pretty noble

and great throughout the whole period of his life. So there's a lot of red flags I'm seeing today. He was charging in today's money $730 per reading. So he was charging a huge amount. Now, in my defense, I've saved that information to the end because today's money $730 per reading. So he was charging a huge amount. Quite a lot.

Now, in my defense, I've saved that information to the end because he loudly and often said that he didn't charge anybody for readings. That was actually

his whole shtick was that he was like, I do this for free. I do not make money from this. And if I heal people or if they get rich off of it, that is none of my business, which was good advertising and it was a good kind of, it made him seem chill.

And it probably is true that he probably really didn't charge most people or some people because otherwise he would have been found out very quickly. But yeah, he was charging a lot of people. He was charging a lot of people a lot of money. You know, what I will say in Edgar's defense, but yeah, he was charging a lot of people. He was charging a lot of people a lot of money. You know, what I will say in Edgar's defense, you know, at the end of our investigation here is, you know, a bit like other people like this, let's say, like, for example,

we did a two-part series on Uri Geller, similar medium psychic telekinetic ability bloke. A lot more recent. A lot more. He's still alive and kicking today. He didn't claim to heal people, thankfully. Uri was studied on a number of occasions by professionals. And even though this was a long time ago,

Edgar was studied once or twice too. Hmm. You know, a group of doctors got together to perform some tests on him, rallied by Dr. John Blackburn in Bowling Green, Kentucky. They devised some tests on him uh rallied by dr john blackburn in bowling green kentucky they devised some tests and they were similar kind of to the type of thing uri was made to do later by the cia right right we're talking you know they would get him to spy on someone who was in another room and he couldn't see what they were doing or on another occasion they got someone to

like walk around new york city and ed Edgar was allegedly able to track their location kind of telepathically. That's pretty cool, to be fair. Now, we did do that Uri episode and his results were pretty impressive, too. But I do seem to remember, you know, those tests were criticized as well for not being badly designed, badly monitored. Yeah. And we know that, you know, just because we're saying there were scientific tests, that doesn't mean those tests were perfect.

No, it really doesn't. Especially, you know, if this guy's getting tested in, when do you say he was alive? The 18... Yeah, 1800s. 1800s. I don't know if we could trust any kind of scientific experiments

being done into powers like this from the 1800s. And even the predictions, you know, it was a mixed bag. We've covered lots of fortune tellers in the past, and we do know that this is a bit of a numbers game. You know, while, whether it's Nostradamus, the great Alexander and Edgar Cayce all made some accurate predictions. We also did an entire bonus episode about how accurately the Simpsons has predicted the future. And some of those were just as good as these predictions.

Even more accurate. It's like predicting Donald Trump becoming president. And going down the elevator, there was like a shot for shot of what happened in the future. It was kind of crazy. And as you pointed out, Rory, some of those prophecies aren't even particularly impressive. You know, predicting that Hitler's going to be in power after Hitler's already really popular. Predicting a recession. I mean, that's literally what economists do for a job.

Right, yeah. And people do pay them a lot of money to do it as well. And, you know, in a more insidious way, you know, we do know that there are, for fake psychics, there are techniques, aren't there? There's tricks and techniques that are established over many years that psychics can perform to appear

as if they're really paranormal when they're not. It's true. You know, it's what we were afraid of at the start of this podcast. As soon as money starts getting involved, that's usually the mark of death on any paranormal case. Whether it's someone who's had an encounter and they use that to launch a book tour,

you know, selling tickets to speeches about their event. It all, it just muddies the whole experience. So if you've got someone claiming to have all these powers who then starts charging for it, it's no different than the psychic horse that we investigated a few weeks ago. That's the same level we're talking about here. A creature that has a gift and you have to pay to use it,

which I believe was also unfortunately a double no. Sounds like you hate entrepreneurship, Rory. Sounds like you hate small businesses. I think if you're a small business like this, I do hate you. Rory, we have, I think in my defense, someone accused me of being a charlatan for presenting this episode. But I would say in my defense, I think I've brought together a pretty balanced assessment

of what one of America's most famous spiritualist mediums and mystics, Edgar Cayce, kind of brought to the table all that time ago. I've shown you, I think, some of his more supposedly amazing feats, but then a little bit of skepticism at the end. But at the end of every episode of this paranormal life we have to decide whether our case is really paranormal or not uh rory what are you saying on the case of edgar casey it feels like you brought me all of his uh magical achievements and then our researcher forced you to also include all of the facts at the end that really show him for who he truly was. Actually, our lawyer, too, told me to include all that.

Hey, it's a great case. It's an interesting person with an interesting life. Don't know where the fairy plays a part in this. That kind of threw me for a loop. I thought it was going to turn out to be an angel, maybe because he was super into the Bible. And then the fairy gifted him his powers, even though he was born with powers.

I think the fairy's told him about his own powers. Yeah. I'm pretty psyched to see a fairy. We don't see enough fairies on the podcast. If the fairy turns up to tell him about his powers, we kind of didn't need the fairy to turn up at all. Because he has the powers. This isn't like a Hollywood screenplay that you get to give notes on. This is a man's

life. I'm just not sure we have the full hero's journey here. Where's our act two? Where's the redemption arc? I think for any young lad who played Ocarina of Time growing up, the hit video game,

I think the idea of a fairy visiting you, a magical fairy visiting you in a forest, that's going to sound like a sexual awakening to you, because that's what it was for most of us, Rory. Right. Right. The fairies in Ocarina of Time were, how do you describe them? Naked, for a start. For a children's video game, it was odd. Yeah, there's memes on the internet of, you know, what it was like to play those

games as a kid. And it was, you know, running around, having a good time in this little village with a sword and a shield and fighting monsters and then going into this borderline sex fountain. Well, yeah, sure. Where these, in hindsight, very pixelated women, it felt very cutting edge and realistic at the time. Right, yeah. It felt like 4K. Burst out of a fountain naked,

screaming, like, Ah! And, you know, pending the Japanese translation, words to the effect of, hey, big boy. Yeah. Really, really, really strange. I don't know who decided to include them in the game.

But you're right. It awakens something within all of us. I don't think that's the exact description of the fairy that got in contact with Edgar. No, I think this is a lot more PG. Right, right, right, right. that got in contact with him? No, I think this was a lot more PG. Right, right, right, right. Look, it's a great story,

but I just don't believe it. I think if you're someone claiming to be a healer, getting sued because you're not really a doctor, even though you're telling people that, and you're charging money. Not sued, arrested. Arrested, even worse. Right, because he broke a law, yeah.

Yeah. Getting arrested implies he was being sued and he continued to do it anyway um and charging people this is such an awful combination of things that um someone hopefully with these powers wouldn't do if they really had them so um i think it's going to be a no for me this week i can't say i didn't see it coming i think we have to chalk it up to a double no at the end of this episode oh um it is just one of those stories uh you got to cover you know we don't we don't pick stories because we think we're going to get yeses out of them at the end of an episode pick them because they're interesting or they're culturally

significant or historically significant and this one definitely is in the world of the paranormal in America. Yeah. It is a key figure. So hope you enjoyed it anyway. I think we always love getting back to this kind of weird period of magic and mysticism back in the day. back in the day. You know, the whole world was a little bit more magical because there was less knowledge around. Yeah, it's really true.

Yeah, we've had a couple now set in this kind of beautiful grey area where science and magic were colliding, where you think we'd be smart enough to know better, and yet people still thought a 14-year-old boy twisting your back would cure your cancer. Honestly, people are still getting up to that. Not even on the other side of the world, just on Instagram. I feel like we've hit a peak of the scientific knowledge and we are really regressing back.

There was probably a few people that were trying to use alchemy to beat COVID-19. Yeah, I think the recession and the COVID-19 global pandemic knocked us back a few decades in terms of that thinking. But hope you enjoy this investigation anyway. Into Edgar Cayce. Let us know what you think at thisparanormallifepodcast at gmail.com. You can also see everything we're up to at thisparanormallife.com including our ongoing tour date.

I think at the time of you're hearing this. We're on it. We're on it. We're on the road. This is past Rory and Kit. Holy shit. Presumably, we're dead. Presumably, we overdosed on heroin

from living the rock star lifestyle in San Francisco. We didn't even make it to show three. We didn't make it out the Bay Area. All right. I'm worried you're kind of manifesting something, which I don't want you to do. Because I don't know if you can predict the future. Hopefully not. Let's try and twist this in a good way.

Brother, my premonition was that I was a bowling ball. I don't have a future. premonition was that I was a bowling ball. I don't have a future. Did I mention I was being bowled into an open grave? By an Undertaker? The Undertaker

from WWE? Analyze that, motherfucker. No, hopefully we are alive. I was bowled into ten tombstones waiting for me in the graveyard. Hopefully we we are alive. I was bowled into 10 tombstones waiting for me in the graveyard. Hopefully we are still alive.

Hopefully we're on the road. And, you know, so if you want to find out whether we're alive, navigate in your web browser to thisparanormalife.com. If the ticket links are still up, bingo, we're still alive and kicking. We're still going to perform the rest of the tour. There should be a few tickets left for every show. So please, bring a friend, bring a family member, someone that you think might enjoy

the show, or your mates who already listen to the show, bring them along. We're having a blast, and I can't wait to see you in person. Hell yeah! We're so excited. Of course, the other home on the internet of this paranormal life is Patreon.com, the place where we. Of course, the other home on the internet of This Paranormal Life is patreon.com, the place where we upload weekly podcasts in the form of the After Party,

as well as full-length bonus episodes every month. We've been doing that for five years or more. There is hundreds and hundreds of episodes of bonus content on patreon.com forward slash thisparanormallife. on patreon.com forward slash this paranormal life five bucks five dollars five pounds whatever it is a month gets you access to a ton of that extra content and it's a great system because all of the money received through patreon goes straight to us to make this project which is a fantastic way that you guys get to support the show and get some really cool rewards in return. That's how we've managed to do everything we've done to date.

And as Roy says, for five bucks to our American listeners. That's a steal. What's that? Couple of beers from the off-license. To our British listeners, it's like a four-pack of baked beans. Fill in your local equivalent of what that could be. But it's like a four pack of baked beans. Fill in your local equivalent of what that could be. But it's not a whole lot. It's not a whole lot to get access to all of that instantly. And at the end of every episode, we like to take the time to thank a couple of our supporters on

the shout out tier. Hell yeah. Special thank you to Thea B. Thea B, we are so glad to have you here with us in the Paranormal Commune. Of course, it's classified what happened to Thea B, we are so glad to have you here with us in the Paranormal Commune. Of course, it's classified what happened to Thea A. God rest their soul. Whoa. We really thought they were going to survive the experimental... So what part of it is classified? You told us everything.

I didn't tell you. We didn't tell what happened. We didn't say what happened to them. You were us everything. I didn't tell you. We didn't tell what happened. We didn't say what happened to them. You were about to. And I will say no more because it would be an insult to their memory. But Thea B, you're fine. You're great.

And if you are so inclined to continue the scientific testing that went on in the classified laboratory underneath the chapel, just let us know. Too much. But I can't say any more because it the chapel. Just let us know. Too much. But I can't say anymore. Too much.

Because it is classified. Thanks to Benjamin Cook. Let him cook. This guy's so good at cooking, he's stacking the Benjamins. Oh, nice. Right, so he's like, he can make really good food.

Is that what you're saying? I think between you and me, it's a little bit more kind of cooking for the streets if you know what I mean. Okay, so drugs? Yeah. Meth?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Essentially, yeah. You can't make Benjamins making f***ing chips. Let me tell you, when this guy's dreaming he isn't talking about 50 milliliters of milk.

50 eggs. Alright? Thanks lastly today to Katie Lafferty. Katie's got too much on her platey. Oh no. She really has. And I'm not really talking about work obligations or personal responsibilities. At the commune buffet, she's got too much on her platey.

Yes, it is a buffet and we do say it is all you can eat But there is a one egg maximum Right So even an egg And it's a quail egg So it's already very, very, very small But that's it If you have the egg, you can't have a string bean Because you've fulfilled your quota of dinner

You had the egg I thought you said you can have more eggs You're saying you can't have anything No, one egg maximum and that's it. Okay. No water. No oxygen.

Stop breathing. So, Katie, you've got too much on your platey. Take the green bean off or you will be arrested, unfortunately. Jesus.

That's news even to me, Katie. Sorry about that. To the dungeons though obviously thanks for your support and thank you to everyone else who supported us on Patreon

we'll be back with more shoutouts from next week we are going to continue on our crazy road trip

which we'll be filling you in about as soon as possible yeah if you want to keep in touch with how things are going very currently, head on to Patreon. Check out the after party.

We're going to be uploading those from the road in hotel rooms. Yeah, recording and uploading. In vans. Just life on the open road. It's going to be great. Unless we're dead. Unless we're dead, like I said. We're not going to be dead.

Well, you know. I do want to go bowling with you now, though, weirdly. I start crying. It's very therapeutic. Yeah, we'll see you guys next Tuesday, hopefully. And on Friday on the After Party. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

Bye-bye. We'll be right back. symphony orchestra music director Gustavo Jimeno in conversation. Together, they dissect the mesmerizing layers of Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, followed by a complete soul-stirring rendition of the famously unnerving piece, Symphony Exploder, April 5th at Roy Thompson Hall. For tickets, visit tso.ca.