Review: The Light Between Us: Stories of the Afterlife

For many pagans, Halloween - or Samhain as we call it - marks the season when the veil between the worlds is thin. As much as being a time to tell ghost stories, it offers an opportunity to try to communicate with loved ones who have passed into the Summerlands.

The Light Between Usis a new autobiography by a psychic medium who, as the saying goes, sees dead people.

Publisher Century says: "Laura Lynne Jackson is a high school English teacher, a wife and mother of three children, and a psychic medium able to converse with souls from the other side. And this is her story."

The Light Between Usis aimed at quite a wide audience - those who believe in an afterlife, those who are curious and open to the possibility that there is more to this life than what the eye can behold, and also at those who are perhaps a little psychic themselves, but have never done much with their gifts.

I read the book while I was laid up in bed suffering from a cold and I not only found it heart-warming - perfect to cheer me up when was feeling grotty - I also found myself nodding in recognition. In particularly, I recognised some of the things that author Laura said about herself when she was learning to come to terms with her psychic gift while she was young.

While I am nowhere near as psychically sensitive as Laura, I do see spirits from time to time, I can sense energy and auras when I try hard, and I have had some contact with loved ones who have passed on - mostly in dreams. When I was a young child, even though I came from a family that believed in such things, it was uncomfortable realising that I wasn't totally normal. I used to sometimes see a ghostly white cat that no one else could see. I learnt not to mention it in case I got teased and in the end it went away.

In The Light Between UsLaura talks about how she tried to be "normal" at school and college. Eventually a visit to a psychic put her on the right track to develop her gift rather than shut it out. She now does pro bono work for the Forever Family Foundation, where she helps parents who have lost children. She has undertaken analysis of her abilities through the Windbridge Foundation, a scientific organisation that studies paranormal phenomena, and had her brain mapped by neuroscientists.

However, Laura’s message in her book isn’t about proving her abilities, it is about sharing an awareness that we are all connected and that there is more than one way of looking at the world.

I enjoyed reading The Light Between Us.If there is one thing I have taken away from it, it is that I should be more confident about trusting my own instincts. Sometimes, what seems like a message from a loved one from beyond the grave, might actually be what it seems.

Links and previous related posts
The Light Between Us: Lessons from Heaven That Teach Us to Live Better in the Here and Now
http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/editions/imprint/century
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2008/10/how-to-celebrate-samhain.html
http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2015/10/a-dream-of-gifts-and-visit-from-dead.html