Speechless
The amazing discovery of how those without speech can communicate
Have you ever thought about what it would be like to lose one of your senses or abilities? I think if I lost a bet with the devil I’d choose the sense of smell. I’d miss out on the olfactory experience riding the Harley but my life wouldn’t change much.
Some of those with autism suffer from a lack of muscle control and, in extreme cases, cannot speak. This affliction is due to non-speech apraxia as some individuals with autism may have difficulties with oral motor skills.
Until recently, the medical field thought these poor souls had a limited mental capacity due to their inability to speak. Referred to as “spellers,” they communicate by typing words on a tablet or pointing to letters and numbers on a Ouija Board-like device.
A few weeks ago I heard a podcast that featured Ky Dickens, who started “The Telepathy Tapes”1 podcast. According to her bio, The Telepathy Tapes “explores telepathy within the nonspeaking community and raises profound questions about consciousness and human potential.”
From The Telepathy Tapes website: “The Telepathy Tapes…explore[s] the profound abilities of non-speakers with autism—individuals who have long been misunderstood and underestimated. These silent communicators possess gifts that defy conventional understanding, from telepathy to otherworldly perceptions, challenging the limits of what we believe to be real.”
Spelling itself is a recent development. Heretofore the non-verbal were considered mentally retarded or unintelligent. Parents had no way to communicate with their children. For example, Madison, a 25-year-old nonverbal autistic woman, spelled out, “I have pain in the back of my mouth” on a letterboard held by her mother. This led to a dentist visit where her wisdom teeth were identified as the issue. Until the use of spelling, Madison would have suffered in silence.
A therapeutic breakthrough experience by an acquaintance is evidence of this phenomena. Here’s the text thread from that therapist. My apologies; it’s a bit long but it’s a real-life example of the power of spelling. Obviously, I’ve hidden the names:
Spelling isn’t just about giving a “voice” to the nonverbal. Parents, teachers and therapists have found something amazing about the spellers: their ability to use telepathy to communicate with others. Yes, it sounds fantastic, but it’s true and has been proven. The parents, teachers and care givers have long known about this but were afraid to talk about it due to societal stigmas.
On the podcast Ms. Dickens relates a number of amazing stories of these abilities:
An autistic college student named Akhil reportedly reads his mother’s thoughts. During tests, Akhil spells out randomly-generated numbers, words, or abstract images his mother is thinking of, without seeing the inputs. Akhil seems to perceive his mother’s awareness, suggesting a “merging of consciousness.”
Spellers are said to access information beyond their physical experience, such as predicting events or reading hieroglyphics.
Parents report instances where their nonverbal children seem to know private thoughts. For example, a mother might think of a specific number or object, and the child spells it out on a letterboard. One X post describes a nonverbal autistic child writing down a 10-digit number the facilitator was thinking of.
One speller was “speaking” Portuguese, but had never learned the language. Ms. Dickens has encountered 15-20 spellers who know languages they were never taught, including Russian and Japanese.
As incredible as all that may seem, there’s something else. Ms. Dickens described a “telepathic chat room” called “The Hill,” where nonverbal autistic individuals connect mentally to share knowledge or discuss their lives. Started by “Houston,” one of the spellers Ms. Dickens knows, The Hill is a place shared by dozens of the nonverbal. Incredulous, Ms. Dickens tested the validity of claims that The Hill exists by asking one participant to pass a message to another. The next day the second repeated almost verbatim the information.
Apparently, there are several Hills, including one in The Netherlands.
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Telepathy isn’t anything new. Mark Twain described what he called “metal telegraphy.” In one case, he thought about his aunt, to whom he hadn’t written in several years. He wrote a letter to her with a postmark of March 2. A few weeks later he received a letter from his aunt postmarked March 2.
Upton Sinclair wrote a book titled “Mental Radio” where he described the various mental thought-sharing experiments he successfully conducted with his wife.
So, do we all have telepathy? There are some who believe we do, but with a diminished capacity due to the prevalence of other modern communication devices. Maybe it’s happened to you. You suddenly think of a friend or relative and the phone rings with their call.
For as much as our scientific community knows, there is so much more we still need to learn.
Have you had any experiences that could only be explained by telepathy?
The Telepathy Tapes is now being developed into a feature film slated for release later this year.