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Children’s unexplained experiences: From stories to science

Seeing | Psychology | 2024-08-10

Two children holding hands, walking in a foggy forest. The misty atmosphere evokes feelings of mystery, adventure, and bonding.

What if your child could feel their friend’s headache in their own head? Would you be able to explain where the boundaries of self begin and end? Or how would you react if your child experienced ‘loving darkness’ during an NDE? Natalia Vorontsova explored these and other fundamental questions about the nature of reality, consciousness, and science with a researcher of children’s transpersonal and extrasensory experiences, Dr. Donna Thomas. Check out Dr. Thomas’s new book, Children’s Unexplained Experiences in a Post Materialist World, published by our own Essentia Books.

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Essentia Foundation communicates, in an accessible but rigorous manner, the latest results in science and philosophy that point to the mental nature of reality. We are committed to strict, academic-level curation of the material we publish.

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