People & places · 12 MIN READ · 8 SOURCE QUOTES
Bruce Moen and afterlife exploration
Bruce Moen is a retired mechanical engineer who read Robert Monroe's books, took the Monroe Institute's Gateway Voyage and Lifeline programs, and turned what he reported into the Exploring the Afterlife series: Voyages Into the Unknown (1997), Voyage Beyond Doubt (1998), Voyage Into the Afterlife (1999) and Voyage to Curiosity's Father (2001), followed by the Afterlife Knowledge Guidebook, which he says holds everything he teaches in his first workshop.
His central practice is retrieval. Moen says a death can include one, when someone who died earlier meets you and escorts you onward, and that people who die suddenly, or who hold fixed beliefs about death, can stay stuck until someone reaches them. In his workshops, he says, participants make contact with such a person, learn what they can, and bring in a nonphysical helper from Focus 27 to lead them to a better place. His reported cases range from a woman waiting for a bus since the 1930s to a pilot frozen in a 1945 dive.
Moen works from Monroe's focus levels, and a 2012 Focus-levels overview in the Monroe Institute Archives quotes his descriptions of Focus 22 to 27. He says he has had only about five classic out-of-body experiences and describes his explorations as closer to a mental exercise. He presents everything as what he found, not as something to take on trust.
Engineer and Monroe Institute graduate who wrote the Exploring the Afterlife books and teaches retrieval: contacting people he reports are stuck after death.
Key points
An engineer with three questions, and five books
Moen, a retired mechanical engineer, says three questions drove him from about age five: where he was before he was here, what he is supposed to do here, and where he goes when he leaves. A 2011 TMI Journal article, citing his first book, says that curiosity led him to Monroe's books and then to the Gateway Voyage and Lifeline programs. A 2013 TMI Journal review says his Afterlife Knowledge Guidebook was designed to bring readers to his own conclusion that the afterlife is objectively real.
Retrieval: helping people he says are stuck after death
Moen says an ordinary death includes a retrieval: a relative, friend or pet who died earlier meets you and escorts you to a better place. The skill he teaches covers harder cases. A person who died too suddenly to notice, who believes death means endless sleep, or who is held inside a group belief can, in his account, stay stuck for decades until someone reaches them. The Institute describes its Lifeline program, which he attended, as teaching participants to help people who may not realize they have died.
How a retrieval goes, as he tells it
Moen says the exercises are done sitting in a chair, fully conscious. In one case he tells in detail, a participant playing the retriever approached a woman who, he says, had died in the mid-1930s and was still waiting at a bus stop. She made it easy for the woman to perceive her, started an ordinary conversation without announcing the death, and learned her name and city. Then she invited a helper from Focus 27 into the scene. The helper posed as someone from the bus company sent with a car, the woman met her grandparents, and she realized what had happened.
Helpers, and his test for guides
Moen's generic word for nonphysical assistants is helper, though others might say guides or angels, and he says what happens in his exercises is left to each person's own helpers. In his Sydney talk he places helpers in Focus 27, where, he says, people never impose their will on anyone, and he separates them from angels, who have graduated from helper school. His test for any guide is simple: if it ever imposes its will or beliefs on you, it is not one he would keep.
Teamwork: helpers, partners and outside checks
Moen presents retrieval as teamwork. In the workshop story the retriever makes contact and a Focus 27 helper takes over. He also describes exploring with human partners: in the Gathering, he says, he and a friend stepped together into the bodies of two beings, looked into each other's eyes and let a feeling of love build. He points to outside checks too: a person who asked him to check on a late grandmother and confirmed his description, and a workshop member who obtained a Japanese pilot's name and village in an exercise and later confirmed them online.
The map he works from: Focus 22 to the Gathering
Moen treats the focus levels as places defined by who is found there. A 2012 Focus-levels overview in the Monroe Institute Archives quotes his descriptions: Focus 22 holds people in unconscious or deranged states, Focus 23 the stuck and isolated, Focus 24 to 26 the belief system territories, and Focus 27 the area of greatest free choice, with centers for education and more. In the territories, he says, people live in heavens and hells built from shared belief, from a Lutheran heaven to a hell of thieves. Beyond Focus 27 he places nonhuman consciousness, including the Gathering.
Perceiver and interpreter: why accounts differ
Moen says a perceiver takes in raw data and an interpreter translates it by matching the nearest similar thing in memory. Furry, four-legged and pointed-eared could become a cat, a dog or a rabbit, so a white cat, a gray kitten and a mountain lion are all possible for different observers. Beliefs color the match too: someone raised to expect demons may see an angel as one. His advice is to let the perceiver gather more detail before settling on a label.
Not mainly an out-of-body traveler
After reading Monroe's first book, Moen spent years trying to leave his body and says he has had perhaps five classic experiences. What he does is closer to a mental exercise: a point of perception with a sense of movement and little clear imagery. His nonphysical sight runs from physical-looking scenes through fuzzy black and white to darkness in which he simply knows what is in front of him. He was frustrated, then angry, until he realized he had been exploring all along.
In their own words
Quotes are checked word for word against the recordings and documents they come from. Bracketed words correct transcription errors; “…” marks an omission.
“As a kid there were these three questions that [I] constantly thought about from age, probably, five years old: where was I before I was here, and what am I supposed to do while I'm here, and where do I go when I leave here. And it was those three questions that eventually drove me to explore beyond this physical world to discover if there's something that's beyond it.”
“And in a normal, natural dying process, that's a retrieval. It's [a] situation in which someone from that side, someone from this afterlife area who lives there, [and] maybe knows you will come to you and get your attention so that they can communicate with you, and then offer to assist you in going to wherever you'd like to go, or to a better place to see what that's like.”
“She used the next step in the process, which is to invite a helper from Focus 27 into the scene to make contact with this woman … the retriever introduced the woman who had died to the helper, and the helper used a [ruse]. He pretended to be someone from the bus company who had been sent with a car [to] take her wherever she wanted to go.”
“In Focus 23, the human inhabitants tend to be those no longer physically alive who have become “stuck” for one reason or another. Often, they are confused about or unaware of their death. Many here attempt to maintain contact with the physical world around familiar people or places. These are the ones we call ghosts.”
“We are never directly aware of the perceiver's perceptions because they come in sort of like raw data. It would be sort of like trying to read [a] text document on your computer, looking at the raw computer code. The information is there, but it needs to be interpreted into a language that we can understand, and that function is handled by something I call an interpreter.”
“I certainly started out being the kind of person who was extremely frustrated, and I went beyond frustrated to angry, because just, I just couldn't do it. I, I just couldn't do it. I kept trying and trying and couldn't do it until I discovered I've been doing it all along. It just wasn't in the way that I expected.”
“One of the acid tests for whether it's worth continuing the relationship for me is if that person ever imposes their will or beliefs on you. They're not the kind of folks I'd be interested in having as guides.”
“The result was so dramatic that [I] stopped teaching that, and didn't teach it again for probably, oh, eight years, because [in the] one workshop that I taught the exercise, three people retrieved aspects of themselves, and [the] change in their identity was so strong that it completely disrupted their ability to function.”
Important things to consider
These are reports, not demonstrations
Every retrieval here is told by Moen or his students. The checks he cites, a pilot's name and village confirmed online and a grandmother's description confirmed by the person who asked him to check, were not independently tested, nor was a prototype device he says tracked a friend moving through the focus levels. He presents it all as what he found, and says not to take it from him.
A 2012 overview calls his map the traditional view
A 2012 Focus-levels overview in the Monroe Institute Archives, a compiled web resource, offers Moen's descriptions of Focus 22 to 27 as the traditional view, while noting that the levels are far less easily identified than people assume, are not purely shared among inhabitants, and can include meeting aspects of your own consciousness.
Expect your own style of perception
By Moen's model, two explorers will describe a scene differently, and many reports are sensed or known rather than seen. He says an unexpected event is a cue to play along. Seeing nothing is not failure; it is where he says he works most often.
Aspects of self are not a beginner exercise
Moen's strongest caution is that an exercise changing your sense of identity can leave you disoriented, depressed or unable to function for days. If that happens, stop, look after yourself and consider qualified support. He recommends training and his earlier workshops first.
Grief calls for care beyond technique
To a bereaved father Moen says dreams are the most common contact, that imagining a shared memory can open the door, and that pushing away the pain of grief pushes away the felt presence. He cannot promise contact. A clinician in the 2006 Hemi-Sync Journal adapted techniques from Lifeline graduate Moen for imagined meetings with late relatives, noting that such work does not depend on an afterlife.
Where this is taught
The Institute describes Lifeline as an advanced residential program, conceived in 1991, that explores Focus 23 to 27; it requires completing a Gateway Voyage (in person, virtual or online) and an approved application. Exploration 27 lists Lifeline, Peak Week or Guidelines as a prerequisite. The Moen material here is older, so check what he currently offers.
Common questions
Who is Bruce Moen?
Bruce Moen is a retired mechanical engineer who read Robert Monroe's books, attended the Monroe Institute's Gateway Voyage and Lifeline programs, and wrote the Exploring the Afterlife series for Hampton Roads between 1997 and 2001: four books on his own explorations, followed by the Afterlife Knowledge Guidebook, which he says holds everything from his first workshop. He says three questions drove him from childhood: where he was before he was here, what he is supposed to do here, and where he goes at death. The Institute's 2003 journal lists him among authors of Monroe-focused books, and a 2012 Focus-levels overview in its archives quotes his descriptions of the focus levels.
What is retrieval in Moen's sense?
Retrieval means helping someone who has died, or whose awareness is stuck, to move on to a better place. Moen says an ordinary death includes one: a relative, friend or pet who died earlier appears, explains what has happened and offers to escort you. The skill he teaches covers harder cases, such as a person who died too suddenly to notice, who believes death is endless sleep, or who is locked inside a shared belief. A 2012 Focus-levels overview in the Institute's archives quotes his website's Focus 23 description, which calls these people stuck, often confused about or unaware of their death, and isolated, and says those who linger near familiar people and places are the ones we call ghosts.
How does Moen say a retrieval is done?
As he describes it, workshop participants sit in a chair, fully conscious, and use the exercise to find the person to be helped. The retriever approaches in a way that makes it easy for the person to perceive the retriever, starts an ordinary conversation rather than announcing the death, and learns what can be learned, such as a name, a city and what the person is doing. Then the retriever invites a helper from Focus 27 into the scene. In his bus stop story the helper posed as someone from the bus company sent with a car, and the woman met her grandparents and realized what had happened.
Why do people describe the afterlife so differently, according to Moen?
His answer is the perceiver and interpreter. A perceiver takes in raw data from physical or nonphysical surroundings, and an interpreter converts it into something familiar by matching it to the nearest similar thing in memory. Fur, four legs and pointed ears can become a gray kitten, a white cat or a mountain lion, depending on what each person has seen. Beliefs shape the match, so he expects Christians, Buddhists, Muslims or Hindus to meet roughly what they expect, and says a person raised to fear demons might see an angel as one.
Do you need an out-of-body experience to explore the way Moen does?
Moen says no. After reading Monroe's first book he spent years trying to leave his body and has had only about five classic experiences. What he does he calls closer to a mental exercise: a point of perception, often a feeling of movement, and little clear imagery. He says nonphysical sight runs along a continuum, from physical-looking scenes through fuzzy black and white to the far end where he mostly works: darkness in which he simply knows what is in front of him. In advice to a bereaved father he says to let the imagination run, not to worry about making it up, and to play along if something unexpected happens.
Is it safe to try Moen's exercises, and does he recommend going alone?
Moen's own caution concerns retrieving aspects of self. Without training, he says, it can cause a belief system crash like an identity crisis, with disorientation, depression, dissociation and feelings of dying soon. After one workshop where three people were overwhelmed, one of them barely leaving a chair for two days, he stopped teaching that exercise for about eight years. He recommends training and says his third workshop assumes the first two. For ordinary retrieval and contact exercises he leaves the experience to each person's own helpers. These are meditative practices, not therapy; anyone distressed or deep in grief should consider speaking with a qualified counselor.
In Monroe’s books
Summarized in our own words; the books are not reproduced on this site.
Journeys Out of the Body. Moen says that after reading Monroe's first book he spent years trying to reproduce Monroe's out-of-body travel, managing only about five classic experiences before settling into a more perceptual way of exploring.
Far Journeys. Moen points to this book for Monroe's account of the Gathering, where beings from other energy systems are described as assembling around Earth to witness a rare event, and he describes his own exploration of that region in his third book.
Keep exploring
Prepared answers open instantly in the chat; anything else you ask gets a fresh answer.
Connected ideas
Sound & programs
Lifeline and helping others
Lifeline takes Gateway graduates through Focus 23 to 27 to help people stuck after death, visit the Park, and retrieve lost parts of themselves.
Read the summary →12 min · 8 quotes · 6 answersStates of awareness
Focus 23 and retrieval accounts
Focus 23 is where Monroe placed people who died confused or alone; Lifeline trains participants to find them, help them and guide them to Focus 27.
Read the summary →12 min · 7 quotes · 7 answersStates of awareness
Focus 27: reception, learning and assistance
Focus 27 is Monroe's Park: a reception area after death with centers for healing, review and learning, and the place Lifeline retrievals are taken.
Read the summary →12 min · 7 quotes · 7 answersSound & programs
Exploration 27
Exploration 27 goes beyond the Park into Focus 27's four centers, the I-There and optional visits to Focus 34 and 35, with accounts from graduates.
Read the summary →12 min · 6 quotes · 6 answersStates of awareness
The Gathering: Focus 34–35
Monroe's name for an assembly of nonhuman presences watching Earth, placed by the Institute at Focus 34/35 and explored only in advanced programs.
Read the summary →12 min · 6 quotes · 7 answers