Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: And welcome back to Coast to Coast George Nori with you.
Speaker 2: Let me tell you about. Nicole Strickland is an afterlife
Speaker 2: and paranormal researcher, best selling author, podcaster, speaker from San Diego, California.
Speaker 2: She's the founder and director of the San Diego Paranormal
Speaker 2: Research Society and the California coordinator to the Ghost Research Society.
Speaker 2: Nicole has been featured in a number of media outlets
Speaker 2: and is known for her research of the legendary RMS
Speaker 2: Queen Mary in Long Beach, California. She obtained a BA
Speaker 2: from the University of Arizona and an MS degree from
Speaker 2: National University. Her book is called The Afterlife Chronicles.
Speaker 3: Nicole Welcome, Welcome, Yeah, thank you so much. Oh my gosh,
Speaker 3: this is such an honor to be on this show.
Speaker 3: So thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2: I'm glad we've got you here. I've been on the
Speaker 2: Queen Mary a couple of times. That ship is haunted.
Speaker 3: Oh my god. I know some people don't believe it.
Speaker 3: I do, right, and then you do.
Speaker 2: But absolutely there's a little girl down there near the
Speaker 2: engine room. What is she doing down there? You know?
Speaker 3: I think I'm sure you're referring to Jackie.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And it's interesting because in my research and even some
Speaker 3: of my colleagues, there's really no origins to really let
Speaker 3: us know where she came from. There's this I don't
Speaker 3: know where this who put this out on the internet
Speaker 3: that her last name may be Torin. I've tried to
Speaker 3: look into that. I can't find any verifiable information that
Speaker 3: would support that. So we don't really know who she
Speaker 3: is or where she comes from. But she seems to
Speaker 3: be very intelligent, very interactive, seems to be drawn to
Speaker 3: certain people. I've seen her myself. She almost looks very
Speaker 3: similar to like a Shirley Temple, around six or seven
Speaker 3: years old. Likes to play and sing, responds a lot
Speaker 3: to nursery rhymes and songs like London Bridges or Twinkle Twinkle,
Speaker 3: Little Star. And she's seen often in the former first
Speaker 3: and third class pool, but she's also been seen and
Speaker 3: interacted with on other areas of the show.
Speaker 2: And during World War Two, that ship was loaded with soldiers,
Speaker 2: wasn't it absolutely?
Speaker 3: In fact? On its July twenty fifth, nineteen forty three, voyage.
Speaker 3: It hit a record and it still holds that record
Speaker 3: today of sixteen thousand, six hundred and eighty three souls
Speaker 3: including servicemen and crew. So it's pretty incredible.
Speaker 2: Wow, what a ship. How did n Carl Strickland get
Speaker 2: involved in the paranormal?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: My goodness.
Speaker 3: Let me try to summarize this. I've always, even from
Speaker 3: a child, I've always had this interest in the unknown,
Speaker 3: specifically ghosts and spirits. I have always, like I said,
Speaker 3: been a tra to studying the unknown and would pretty
Speaker 3: much read or watch anything I could about the paranormal.
Speaker 3: And so that interest stayed with me throughout my elementary,
Speaker 3: middle and high school years. And it almost culminated after
Speaker 3: I had a very profound experience with my maternal grandmother,
Speaker 3: Helen low Pinto, and she called me the night before
Speaker 3: she passed, and then the following day, my mom, of course,
Speaker 3: her daughter called me and I knew from the tone
Speaker 3: of her voice that something was wrong, and she told
Speaker 3: me that she had passed on and transitioned, and so
Speaker 3: I after a few days, I went back to San
Speaker 3: Diego to attend her services. I was going to the
Speaker 3: University of Arizona at the time, and so when I
Speaker 3: came back to the University of Arizona, I started having
Speaker 3: odd experiences in my apartment that I couldn't explain. So
Speaker 3: I thought, am I projecting this? Is this some sort
Speaker 3: of bereavement hallucination on my part? Don't Now that I
Speaker 3: think about it, I don't think so. I think she
Speaker 3: truly visited me. But that was such a profound experience
Speaker 3: and that's really what catapulted me into active investigation of
Speaker 3: the paranormal. And so that's kind of how it all
Speaker 3: started for me.
Speaker 2: And you jumped in in a big way because you
Speaker 2: are very heavily involved in all these things, aren't you. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I've been doing this for about twenty years, give or take,
Speaker 3: and I've had the pleasure of working with different teams
Speaker 3: in Southern California and seeing how different people approach investigation
Speaker 3: and different methodologies. And so in two thousand and nine,
Speaker 3: that's when I founded the San Diego Paranormal Research Society,
Speaker 3: and so we've been going strong. We've obviously investigated historical
Speaker 3: landmarks and businesses, even some private residences, but we like
Speaker 3: to educate. You know, we're not experts or anything, but
Speaker 3: we like to educate the public on how to invest
Speaker 3: gate the paranormal. We even did tours at the Rancho
Speaker 3: Buenavista Adobe, which is a known historical landmark in Vista, California.
Speaker 3: We did fundraising paranormal tours there for about ten years
Speaker 3: and so, and I do a lot of presentations on
Speaker 3: the paranormal, different topics and whatnot. So it's really it's
Speaker 3: a passion of mine and I take my work quite seriously.
Speaker 2: Nicole, what do you views on the paranormal? Just what
Speaker 2: do you think it is?
Speaker 3: Well, there's so many you know, there's different facets. You know,
Speaker 3: you have the study of you know, ghosts and hauntings
Speaker 3: and spirit communication, you have ufology, cryptozoology, you have the
Speaker 3: study of a cult, you know, paranormal. Some people think
Speaker 3: that it is more of a pseudoscience. Other people think
Speaker 3: that it can legitimately be a science. I'm kind of
Speaker 3: in between that. I think that it obviously entails experiences
Speaker 3: that we can't necessar fairly explain one hundred percent by science.
Speaker 3: But I'm of the belief that there's almost a connection,
Speaker 3: or almost a matrix between different energies. And I don't
Speaker 3: know if that has to do with a collective consciousness
Speaker 3: or a greater consciousness of the metaverse or different universities.
Speaker 3: But I just feel that it's there's information out there,
Speaker 3: and I think that when we pass on, speaking of humans,
Speaker 3: even animals, when we pass on from or when physical
Speaker 3: death occurs in our soul lives on, I think that
Speaker 3: we have access to a lot of greater knowledge that
Speaker 3: can be bestowed on the living.
Speaker 2: So what are your thoughts of the paranormal research teams
Speaker 2: and some of the equipment they use and things like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's some teams are are a mix that utilise
Speaker 3: a mix of science based methodology, some teams and metaphysics
Speaker 3: employing psychic mediums, and other people use one or the other,
Speaker 3: they use both. There's so many different types of teams,
Speaker 3: and I really wish that there could be more of
Speaker 3: a framework whereby all teams can almost utilize to have
Speaker 3: more of the control set in place. So again, I know,
Speaker 3: the San Diego Paranormal Research Society we like to concentrate
Speaker 3: on and I know a lot of people cringe at
Speaker 3: the word science or scientific, but I'll use it. But
Speaker 3: more science based like methodologies, so spirit photography, audio experimentation,
Speaker 3: different types of environmental monitoring, but also mixing in some
Speaker 3: of metaphysical techniques as well, like employing divining rods or pendulums,
Speaker 3: even employing psychic mediums. Of course that needs to be
Speaker 3: done of course with cat is to avoid bias and
Speaker 3: all that. So there's so many now with social media,
Speaker 3: I think, and more interest in the paranormal. There are
Speaker 3: so many teams out there. But I also think too
Speaker 3: that there's a difference between a group of people that
Speaker 3: want to go thrill seek. Now there's nothing wrong with that,
Speaker 3: but there is a difference between the thrill seeking mentality
Speaker 3: and those that actually utilize and employee paranormal research because
Speaker 3: there's so many different aspects of that. You have what
Speaker 3: I call adjunct type of research. So you're doing client interviews,
Speaker 3: you're doing historical research, you're doing property research, even sometimes
Speaker 3: genealogical or geological research, so you have all those components.
Speaker 3: Then you have the investigation or sometimes if you have
Speaker 3: tenure out of property and you're doing more of a
Speaker 3: case study, you have all this stuff that you have
Speaker 3: to review and it takes time and it's tedious, and
Speaker 3: so there's a difference between thrill seeking and more of
Speaker 3: a legitimate paranormal research approach to it. So I think
Speaker 3: that that's, in my opinion, can almost delineate, not delinea
Speaker 3: but kind of convolute the research process because there's so
Speaker 3: many different types of teams and different personalities and whatnot
Speaker 3: going into it. So I really do think that in
Speaker 3: the future, I hope that we can have more of
Speaker 3: a standard framework whereby all teams can employ. That way,
Speaker 3: there's more control set in place, and we can test
Speaker 3: more theories and hypotheses.
Speaker 2: Well with fair normal investigator Nicole Strickland. Our website is
Speaker 2: her name linked up at coast tocosdam dot com and
Speaker 2: her book is called The Afterlife Chronicles. Tell us a
Speaker 2: little bit about the book.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, you know. I tell people that really it
Speaker 3: took less than a year to write, but really it
Speaker 3: took my entire life span so far, pretty much because I.
Speaker 2: Had I was going to say, less than year is
Speaker 2: not bad, not bad.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it was about a year. But I've
Speaker 3: had people tell me that it's almost like an encyclopedia.
Speaker 3: I never thought about that. And it's interesting because after
Speaker 3: I wrote it, I was going through and I said
Speaker 3: to myself, oh my goodness, there's so much information in here.
Speaker 3: Are people going to be turned off by that, but
Speaker 3: that's the one thing that people really like. So I
Speaker 3: talk about different aspects the afterlife, so the distinction between
Speaker 3: ghosts and spirits, spirit communication with the living, recognizing the
Speaker 3: signs of spirit communication, the role of intuition and mind,
Speaker 3: body and spirit, and connecting with the afterlife. I have
Speaker 3: a chapter on there. I think it's chapter four, where
Speaker 3: examine the profound or what I think is the profound
Speaker 3: connectedness between the living world and the afterlife, misconceptions, communicating
Speaker 3: with the spirit realm, both standard techniques and more metaphysical technique,
Speaker 3: spirit guides, and even also talking a little bit about
Speaker 3: grief and loss and how connecting with the other side
Speaker 3: can help in the grief and loss process. And what's
Speaker 3: interesting is I have I think I had about seventeen contributors,
Speaker 3: and they each opted to share a story, and those
Speaker 3: stories help to support the topics that are addressed in
Speaker 3: the book. So it was really a passion to write
Speaker 3: very cathartic as well.
Speaker 2: What do you think the afterlife really is, Nicole? I mean,
Speaker 2: what does it function for I?
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, this is let me try to condense this.
Speaker 3: I do think that when we pass on that our
Speaker 3: soul or our true essence does survive physical death. There's
Speaker 3: a lot of science or basically in the form of
Speaker 3: a near death experiences, there isn't really there's no proof
Speaker 3: of the afterlife. Some people believe that consciousness and the
Speaker 3: soul are the same thing. Others may believe that the
Speaker 3: afterlife is dependent on our beliefs. Does it exist regardless,
Speaker 3: Some say there's no scientific evidence of the afterlife.
Speaker 2: Others do.
Speaker 3: I do feel that it's a place of where we
Speaker 3: can where our soul does mature and goes through the
Speaker 3: ranks of spiritthood. So and with NDEs, even near death experiences,
Speaker 3: people of all different ages, different cultural backgrounds, and this
Speaker 3: has been going on for years. They describe these same
Speaker 3: traits or similar traits that people go through during an NDE,
Speaker 3: and they often say that where they go, they've encountered
Speaker 3: departed loved ones. They've recalled their animals running up to
Speaker 3: them and greeting them. And they've often said that where
Speaker 3: they go it's so utterly beautiful, more vivid, with colors
Speaker 3: that we don't even see on earth. They can even
Speaker 3: some people have even said that the environment where they
Speaker 3: go almost matches similarities that were known to them, cultural
Speaker 3: similarities that were known to them when they were of bodies.
Speaker 3: So I do think it's a place that we evolve.
Speaker 3: I think it's a beautiful place. I'm not going to
Speaker 3: say it's heaven, right, but it's I do think it exists,
Speaker 3: but we just can't. We're not yet at that point
Speaker 3: to scientifically prove it.
Speaker 2: Have you ever had a situation that just scared the
Speaker 2: living daylights out of you?
Speaker 3: Scared? You know, that's a good question. I haven't. I've
Speaker 3: done a lot of research, a lot of investigations, even
Speaker 3: at asylums, sanitariums like Waverley Hills. Let's see what else,
Speaker 3: abandoned hospitals, you name it, prisons. I haven't really ever
Speaker 3: been scared, per se. I've had a couple of experiences.
Speaker 3: There was one, oh gosh, I think this was around
Speaker 3: twenty ten, and that we were investigating an abandoned mental
Speaker 3: asylum here in southern California, and there was a part
Speaker 3: in one of our in one of the rooms, we
Speaker 3: were setting up a static I think it was an
Speaker 3: infrared camera tripoted it and everything, and I remember this
Speaker 3: humanoid black figure, almost darker than black, just appeared appeared
Speaker 3: to be like seven or eight feet pall just charged
Speaker 3: at us. And so that's one of the times where
Speaker 3: I actually truly exited the building. So I don't really
Speaker 3: get scared really a lot, but that's one encounter that
Speaker 3: I can recall where I was like, oh, maybe.
Speaker 2: A little bit, just a little bit, just a little bit.
Speaker 2: What have been some of the weirdest stories some of
Speaker 2: your investigators have told you.
Speaker 3: On my investigations are just people on other people telling.
Speaker 2: Me people in general, Oh my goodness.
Speaker 3: I've had a lot of experience or people telling me
Speaker 3: where they've well after life paranormal, let's see, I've from
Speaker 3: starting with me, I've had a lot of experiences where
Speaker 3: profound experiences like with the part of loved ones, dream
Speaker 3: visitations with loved ones. But I think shadow figure. A
Speaker 3: lot of investigators that I've talked to have had a
Speaker 3: lot of interesting experiences with shadow figures. And we don't
Speaker 3: you know, there's the classic shadow figure that is thought
Speaker 3: to be maybe related to the MiB or men in
Speaker 3: black or alien species or whatnot. It's thought to maybe
Speaker 3: observe the living. It's either really tall or really short.
Speaker 3: I've had a lot of investigators share some unique stories
Speaker 3: about about shadow figures and how they just seemed to
Speaker 3: like be here to observe the living. I'm trying to
Speaker 3: think of like really really odd stories. I have one.
Speaker 3: It's not really paranormal per se, but it really does
Speaker 3: support the idea that all investigators should have some sort
Speaker 3: of emergency plan in place. And this was we were
Speaker 3: actually investigating let's see, I'm not going to say the
Speaker 3: name of the restaurant, but it was up in Ocean side.
Speaker 3: It's actually built on top of a Native American burial ground,
Speaker 3: and so we were there. We were about an hour
Speaker 3: into the investigation. We were broken up into two teams,
Speaker 3: and the other team radioed me and said, stay where
Speaker 3: you are. This place has just been robbed. And so
Speaker 3: what happened is two men actually came right through the
Speaker 3: kitchen door armed with a gun and they were, I
Speaker 3: guess going to steal or whatnot. And so we had
Speaker 3: to stay on the premises and talk to the police
Speaker 3: and everything. So that's something that you don't really think
Speaker 3: you'll encounter, but you could as well. So that's but
Speaker 3: there's so many to so many different types of experiences.
Speaker 2: Listen a lot. I had one a couple days ago,
Speaker 2: this is weird. Two days ago, I have not thought
Speaker 2: of the actor James Earl Jones in five or ten years.
Speaker 2: Oh right, But a couple of days ago it just
Speaker 2: hit me, is he still with us? What's he up to?
Speaker 3: Oh? My god?
Speaker 2: It was weird. And then the next day he dies
Speaker 2: at the age of ninety three, and it's big news
Speaker 2: all over the place, and I'm going, I haven't thought
Speaker 2: of him in five or ten years. I think of him,
Speaker 2: and the next day he dies. What's that all about?
Speaker 3: That? You know? That's those types of things have happened
Speaker 3: to me as well, and I've heard stories like that
Speaker 3: from others. It's I think we can just sometimes tap
Speaker 3: into things. And I wonder if it has to do
Speaker 3: with this idea of collective consciousness or being able to
Speaker 3: tap into knowledge that we don't necessarily know at the time,
Speaker 3: but we can sense it ahead of time. Is it
Speaker 3: a premonition? I don't know, but I just I think
Speaker 3: it has to do with this idea that we're all connected.
Speaker 2: I mean, clearly, I asked myself the question, is he
Speaker 2: still alive? I didn't know. I just didn't know. And
Speaker 2: then I checked and he was alive except the next day.
Speaker 2: The big story is he dies at the age of
Speaker 2: ninety three.
Speaker 3: That is incredible, absolutely incredible. My grandmother actually had this
Speaker 3: ability to where she would know certain things. I don't
Speaker 3: want to say it's an ability. It may have been coincidental.
Speaker 3: I don't know if I believe in coincidences.
Speaker 2: There are no coincidences.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I say that I kind of I guess
Speaker 3: in a safety sort of way because I agree with
Speaker 3: that as well. I don't think that. I don't believe
Speaker 3: in any coincidences. I think everything happens for a reason.
Speaker 3: But my grandmother sometimes would envision things or say, oh,
Speaker 3: this is going to happen, and then it does. So
Speaker 3: it's really bizarre how that happens.
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