One evening around 9 or so, I decided to take a relaxing bath, and I lit a candle, turned the bathroom light out, put on some soft music, and relaxed in the water.  I did this occasionally, no big deal.  However, this night, as I relaxed and kept my mind clear of thoughts, I "heard" a voice speaking to me.  It was not really a sound in my apartment, but I could hear it in my mind as a voice.  I could sort of sense that there was a small group of beings, in the upper left of the sky (far, far away) kind of sitting around a conference table or something, and one of them was speaking to me, on behalf of the group. 

Now, let me back up and say that I am not a religious person.  My family didn't baptize me or raise me in any religion, but I had a taste of several different religions' church services and such as I was growing up, and I had sometimes prayed to God to give me a sign that He was real, or that I should believe the religious ideas that I heard and read about.  I sincerely made those prayers, but didn't receive any answers, at least not direct answers that I felt I could rely on.  I feel I am a good, well-intentioned person, and an open-minded seeker of truth, so I have always hoped that if there is a God, he/she would be okay with this, at least - that my heart is open and I try to "do unto others as I would have them do unto me".  I am also not a superstitious person.  I studied sciences and social sciences in university and have several degrees, so I usually think logically and rationally, and look for proof, but also have a healthy respect for the wonder of this world and this life - there is much more to the story than any of us know, and I respect that and am awed by it.  I have never been drawn to meditation or imagery or "guided imagery" - in fact, in a group setting (such as a class or a talk or something) when guided imagery is begun by the lecturer, I usually don't participate.  It's not that I scoff; I think this can be a very powerful thing at some times for some people, and I don't want to let some bozo direct my thoughts (towards imagining a tropical beach or whatever!)   

Therefore, at the time of the incident, I did not really believe in God or positive spirits but was open to their existence, I didn't really believe in negative spirits either, but was equally open to the fact that they might exist, I didn't "meditate" in any formal way and didn't want to try it.  I was just relaxing in a warm bath on a normal night, albeit at a very unhappy time in my life. 

I had one glass of wine that evening with dinner, I think.  I don't drink much, don't smoke, never did any drugs. 

So, back to the story. This voice "spoke" to me, and told me "We are from XYZ."  I do know what name he used, but I do not feel like sharing it here.  At the time, it was a completely new name to me - I'd never heard it before.  However, I instantly knew how it was spelled and could picture the word in my mind (and the spelling is a bit odd).  It wasn't a planet or anything that simple.  Later I found out that it has about 5 different meanings, means something in Arabic and Hebrew, was mentioned in the Bible, can be used as a person's name, etc.  But at the time, it was the first time in my life I'd heard it.  And when the voice said that to me, I thought, "Well, um, okay?" 

The speaker seemed to be male, but I couldn't really tell.  Couldn't "see" what he looked like, nothing except it felt that he was with a group, they were all directing their attention from deep in space onto little old me, naked in my tub.  I had no idea what they wanted, as I had not asked for any kind of communication.  I am not sure, but I think I asked (mentally, not out loud) what they wanted. 

Now the strange thing is, I didn't freak out, I didn't think this was weird, I didn't worry about my mental health, because it was all so realistic as it was happening. 

I don't remember what his answer was.  I am not sure whether he did answer me.  Maybe he did - I just think that I have forgotten the answer.  It was only a few years ago, but what happened after that captured my attention, and I forgot some of the other details. 

I then asked him, "Show me something to prove who you are," or something like that.  I wanted him to show me something.  And he said, "What do you want to see?"   

Now this sounds awfully shallow now, and maybe I failed some kind of cosmic test by being so mundane about it all, but I said that I would like to see what a man I had dated a couple of times that summer was up to that very moment, as I had not heard from him in a while.  I figured that this request would not be controversial, it didn't have any religious overtones, and I was genuinely curious.  I guess not being a person of a religious mindset, I didn't ask to know the meaning of life or anything important, which maybe I should have. 

But, actually, let me explain something -- I didn't have a "handle" on whether that group of people who told me they were from XYZ (real name withheld) were actually good spirits, bad spirits, part of a religious situation, real living people on earth, people from another planet, or WHAT.  I certainly got no feeling that this was God, and I also got no feeling that this was the Devil.  Because I'm not religious, I had no descriptors for what this contact might be. 

I wasn't afraid, just curious.  I also didn't feel any especial warmth coming from them.  It was simply a communication. 

Therefore, I wasn't likely to ask them one of life's big questions, as I had no idea who they were. 

Anyway, after I asked to be shown what this guy I had a crush on was up to at that very moment (I will call the guy Nick), the voice said to me, "Are you sure you want to do that?  It might not be a good idea."  Or something very similar to that. 

Without thinking about it, because I didn't see how any bad consequences could arise from simply seeing Nick in my mind's eye, I said, "Yes, I'd like to see him."  The voice did not explain to me why it might not be a good idea, he just instantly showed me an image of Nick. 

I saw:  From an overhead perspective, I saw Nick sitting in a lovely bedroom in a very nice house, sitting on the bed, with his back to me, sitting looking out the window, out towards the sea (the house was on some kind of cliff over a sea).  He was alone, and he was very sad.  This was not a house I recognized, and I could tell that he was in another country.  I didn't know that he had any plans to be in another country, but he travelled very frequently, so it was likely that he was travelling somewhere that week. 

Well, that was that!  Experience over.  I went back to my bath, slightly bemused at the whole thing, but strangely (since I'm not superstitious) I didn't really bat an eye at the concept, and it had all seemed very real.  Though, I wondered if maybe I had been dreaming.  I don't fall asleep in the bathtub, though, usually, I didn't feel as if I had been asleep then, I don't daydream, and I don't even remember my dreams from a normal night's sleep, so it would be rare indeed for that to have been a dream.  I felt wide awake the whole time.   

I got out of the tub, got ready for bed, did a few things around the house.  About an hour later, because the image of seeing Nick sitting there, being so sad, was still with me, I sent him a cell phone text message asking, "Is everything okay?"  Just that much, nothing else.  He usually was busy working or travelling, or playing hard to get, and usually wouldn't reply to texts or emails for a long time, so I didn't expect a response from him, but it felt better to me at least to reach out to him in that small way.  And he texted back immediately.  Within 60 seconds.  His reply was, "No, I am very upset."  I wrote back, "What has happened?"  He wrote back, "I am at my parent's house in France, my grandfather has died, his funeral is tomorrow."  I responded, "I'm so sorry to hear that.  I had thought maybe something might be wrong."  Then he wrote, "Who is this?  Your name is not coming up on the phone's screen."  So he didn't even know that it was me!  He had obviously erased my name and number from his cell phone's address book, which was not a surprise to me, as it didn't seem that he wanted to date me any more that summer. I wrote him that who I was wasn't important, I was just a friend, and I didn't want to bother him anymore during this sad time. 

I knew that he had grown up in a very nice house on the south coast of France, and his story mirrored perfectly the image that the people from the "upper left" section of outer space had shown me. 

But what was I to do with that information, or that experience?  I had no idea.  I wasn't afraid of those people, nor did I necessarily want more contact with them.  I just left it alone, and didn't worry about it, but didn't try to forget about it either.  I never told anyone this story, not even Nick.  I barely thought about it. 

Two years later, I was working at a 3-day conference with 2 other people whom I had never met before and would never see again.  One was a man in his 60s, one a man in his 20s.  We all spent about 4 hours together on the first day of the conference, and the man in his 20s and I got along great.  We talked about typical, impersonal things, but the conversation flowed and it was enjoyable to work with him.  That night, he called me and asked if he could meet me for a coffee before the conference started the next day.  He still lived with his mother, and he told me that he'd told her my name when he got home from the  conference and instantly she had told him what I looked like, what I acted like, things like that, and that she had some messages for me that he could pass on to me.  I am open-minded, and this kind of thing doesn't happen every day, so I agreed to meet him.  It was an amazing meeting, where he conveyed to me what his mom had told him.  Stories from my personal experience that no one could have known, tales of things that other people had done to me (without my knowing about it) that helped me to fit some weird events and lots of "bad luck" in my life together and see that there were bad aims behind those terrible happenings, and warnings for my future course, etc.  Very interesting.  He said his mom was a seer, and never took money for helping people, and didn't want to know me, and that I would never meet him again (after our time working at the conference was over).  She said other things that I don't want to convey here, but there is one thing that I will convey here: 

The guy said, "And what was some kind of incident about 2 years ago that you had, some kind of spirit connection or conversation?  My mom can see that in your past."  I briefly explained to him what had happened in the tub (not telling him the name of their group; I have never told another person - I guess that I AM superstitious in some ways!) and he said, "Oh my God, yes, that's just the kind of thing she was picking up on."  He told me that I hadn't done anything exceptionally wrong, but I really wasn't supposed to interact with them, and I certainly should NEVER, NEVER have asked them to show me something -- he said when they gave me the warning of "Are you sure?" that I should have run as fast as I could away from the situation.  He said that I had upset God with my behavior in that incident, and this information had come through clearly to his mom, but I wasn't in big trouble, since it was out of ignorance more than deliberate bad or selfish intentions.   

I was floored - I don't know how an agnostic person is supposed to react to hearing something like that.  A year later, I prayed to God (if he/she exists) and asked forgiveness for that incident.  I've never tried to contact that group, and they've never contacted me.  But I have a tiny feeling that they are out there, and that if I tried to contact them, I could.  But I don't have anything I want from them, and I don't really think they have anything they want from me... or maybe they did want something from me, or want to get me into trouble?  I don't know.  It all feels completely out of my depth, and I guess it's easy for me not to think about it most of the time.   

Additionally:  Last year I sold many of my books, some of them which I'd bought but never read.  I had kept one book for maybe 6 years, but had never read it.  The night that someone bought it (on an auction website), I flipped through it very quickly before packaging it up, just to make sure there were no bookmarks or papers tucked inside - like 10 seconds of flipping the pages. This was a biography about a man who'd lived in another country, 100 years ago. And my eyes lit on a page where the name of that group in the sky was printed.  Not only that, but there was a coincidental story about that name - the man who was the subject of the book had a very good friend who had taken "the name" as his last name when he was an adult.  It was an unusual name, and people didn't know why he changed his own last name for it.  However, the story went that he had heard this name "spoken" to him when he was alone (!!!!), and several years later, he changed his last name to it, because he liked the sound of it.  That was 100 years ago, in another country.  So that really freaked me out. 

The bathtub experience was curious, and I am pretty certain that I was not hallucinating.  I cannot explain it, the origins, the reasons, the repercussions, whether there are any dangers - I just don't know.  I don't often think of it.  But the coincidence of finding that name in a book years later, and the book's story of one man's introduction to that name, makes me wonder what in the world it's about.  It feels very large and incomprehensible to me.   

The meeting with the young man, and all that his mother said for him to tell me (which was much more than I am relating here) affected me more profoundly. I don't know if it made me believe more in God (which I'm a little closer to now, but am not sure), but it leads me to be much more open to the idea that things are very interlinked in our universe, that people can receive information that there is no material way they could know about, that there is probably some kind of tussle between good and evil, and that perhaps I, who has bumbled along in life being mostly honest, good, gullible, and unsuspicious of others, darn well better get some psychic (or whatever) shields up.  I ask that God protect me, even if I'm not very sorted out in my religious beliefs.