Here is my account of my unusual interview experience with Dr. Jackson

As a veteran interviewer of nearly 20 years, I've met hundreds of movie stars, musicians, pop icons, directors and authors. For example, I have conducted numerous broadcast interviews with celebrities (I've done Harrison Ford, Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Clint Eastwood, Sean Connery, Whoopi Goldberg, and Julia Roberts, to name a few) and a vast number of rock stars. However, I have never quite had an experience like the one that occurred when I met recently with Dr. Steve Jackson who was promoting his new book. This was the first serious dent in the protective armor that one uses to navigate through a job in the world of media in New York.

I strongly urge the producers of any television talk shows that have authors for guests to delve into Dr. Jackson's book, permit him to appear on your show and give him and opportunity to share this mysterious and quite beautiful information with their viewers. If he is allowed to demonstrate his Reiki healing techniques and discuss his book, 8 Steps to Love, which is at heart a self-help book and guide to interpersonal relations, I believe it could be a POWERFUL and ENTHRALLING hour of television. Should any producers want to contact me for further information, feel free to call me at 973-378-5815 or email me at quiltduck@aol.com

Sincerely,
Donald McLaughlin

My Skepticism and the Nausea
This is what happened. We were about to tape a half hour segment. Since I always do a certain degree of research of my interview subject, I had read Dr. Jackson's book, but with some skepticism. As a lapsed Catholic, I tend to look askance at the phenomenon of alternative and ancient healing techniques. However, within moments of starting the interview, Dr. Jackson had severely shaken my "paradigm" or world-view. He demonstrated what I later learned was an ancient Tibetan and Japanese healing technique called Reiki. We were about to begin the interview when the engineer ran into a technical glitch and we needed to put it off for nearly an hour. Everyone agreed to get breakfast at a nearby diner. Unfortunately, I had eaten some bad seafood the night before and my stomach was raw and queasy from a rough bout of nausea. In fact, I was still quite ill that morning. Dr. Jackson asked if he could demonstrate the Reiki healing techniques on me. I agreed, but there was a deep disbelief on my part. He grew quiet, steadied his hands over my abdomen for about ten minutes. I felt something like a hand probing inside my intestines. My skin grew hot and flushed. My eyes watered involuntarily. Dr. Jackson proceeded to pull his hands away from my stomach and I felt a sensation as if a baling hook had grappled into my gut and was removing the pain. This went on for several minutes after which I was fine to go get a quick bite. I told Dr. Jackson I was impressed with what he had done, but wanted a longer session.

I found Dr. Jackson to be extraordinarily articulate, with a wide range of ideas and interests. It's impossible to walk away from any discussion with him and not be impressed with the scope of his knowledge and insight. Furthermore, he is gifted with a fair degree of charisma and charm. A former college and professional basketball player who is in the Basketball Hall of Fame for his outstanding performance in college, he's 6 feet 5 inches tall, lean and looks about 12 years younger than he is. Reviewing the tape later, I noticed he's extremely "videogenic." He was also quite candid in discussing how he used the techniques he developed in the trenches of clinical practice on healing his own life. He indicated how he has always subscribed to the ancient admonition, "Physician Heal Thyself." He also discussed how he has explored other ancient healing practices as when he studied with Mayan shaman healers on his trips to Guatemala. In his book, he discusses his spiritual awakening. He describes the experiences that led him to the discovery that he had the ability to transmit a healing energy. The first experience involved being awakened by a divine purple light in the middle of the night followed by a white light that had a loving consciousness. But until I experienced what Dr. Jackson could do, I thought all of this stuff was complete and utter nonsense.

My TMJ and the Longer Session
Here's what happened when I submitted for that longer session of Reiki healing. I asked Dr. Jackson to join me at my parents and nearby house since they were quite curious about this "Reiki" business. I sat in a chair while Dr. Jackson placed his hands some distance from my head in order to address a chronic painful problem with TMJ (my jaw is misaligned). To the astonishment of my parents, after some 10 minutes I proceeded to make grimacing faces. There was a strange violet light INSIDE of my head and Japanese characters and symbols flooded my field of vision. I saw a strange snake-skin pattern and there was fragmented images of an ancient, clay-baked village. I could feel the presence of a benign, peaceful, almost intelligent white light probing within the "systems" of my body. Once again, my skin grew extremely hot and my cheeks were wet with involuntary tears. I could feel very strong sensation physical manipulation although my parents later vouched that Dr. Jackson never touched me.

Toward the end of the session something TRULY extraordinary happened. I began to laugh. It seemed as though "something"within me was resisting this process and was holding it up to ridicule and contempt. Dr. Jackson spoke to this "entity" and commanded it to yield and depart. An eerie peace descended over me and I began to breathe in deep, cleansing gulps of air through my nostrils and mouth. This "trance" was soon lifter. I woke up but was extremely groggy, and emitted a series of powerful, body-wracking yawns, totally unlike anything I'd ever experienced. I was alert yet craved sleep. For the next several days, I was urinating copious quantities every on to two hours. Dr. Jackson explained that this was my body purging itself of toxins. I realized that something very bizarre and profound had occurred to me.

Distant Healing Sessions
I called Dr. Jackson the next day to ask him point blank "what the hell" had happened to me. He explained the history of Reiki and how he also did long range healing. I was in Maplewood, N.J., a suburb of New York and he was about 125 miles away in Wilmington, Delaware. He asked me to sit down somewhere quiet and get relaxed. Once again, it took about 10 minutes to feel the "tractor beam" of Reiki. It was a very strong session, much shorter than the one on the previous day, but it was quite intense. In fact, my teenage son bounded into the room and thought I was having a heart attack! I was breathing deeply, grimacing rapidly and found that I could not even speak to address his concerns. All I could do was to croak out a low and guttural command: "Go." My wife entered the room and was extremely upset and it was then that I confided my experience of the previous day.

Surprising Side Effects
A surprising side-effect of our sessions concerned several growths on my skin that were quite painful and raw and had recently been excised to be examined as potential skin cancers. These minor operations left some unsightly " holes" in my flesh which were quite red and irritated. They are currently closing over, healing, possibly going away for good. Furthermore, I feel good, my attitude is improved, more positive. I feel like I want to be a better person, father and husband. I could feel years of built-up negative emotions slough off. Since then, I have received several other long-distance Reiki sessions all with similar healing results. I mentioned earlier that I was a lapsed Catholic. After the Reiki healing sessions, I found myself (surprising even me!) at the Communion rail with an open heart for the first time in 15 years. Dr. Jackson's techniques showed me in no uncertain terms that there was something beyond my little puffed-up and self-satisfied world of entertainment journalism.