Big ideas · 11 MIN READ · 8 SOURCE QUOTES
The monitor's role in an Explorer session
In an Explorer session the monitor was the second voice on every tape. Seated in the control room, usually Monroe on the original series and later staff such as Rita Warren and Martin Warren, the monitor heard the Explorer through a microphone, spoke back through the Explorer's headphones, fed in different Hemi-Sync signals and watched the instruments that tracked the body. The Explorer lay in total darkness in the booth, so between the two rooms almost everything happened by voice.
The work had four parts. Guiding meant taking the Explorer into Focus 10 and Focus 12, asking for a description of the state and sending the Explorer on toward a higher source of information. Questioning meant asking for detail, relaying the lab's questions to whatever the Explorer met and rewording a question when the answer showed it was flawed. Supporting meant noticing discomfort, doubt or struggle, then bringing the Explorer back with a count, a signal and a debrief. Watching meant reading the gauges so that a silence could be told from a problem.
For anyone reading the transcripts, the monitor is half of the evidence. A question can ask for a description or suggest a subject, and the Explorer's answer is often a reply to it. Reading the monitor's lines first shows which ideas the Explorer brought and which the conversation supplied.
The monitor sat in the control room, guided Explorers through states, relayed their questions to contacts and watched the gauges; on the original tapes it was Monroe.
Key points
Control room, headphones, instruments
The monitor worked from a control room near the booth. It held the sensitive equipment that received data from the Explorer and sent signals back as needed. Monroe's description is simple: modified headphones let the Explorer hear the monitor and the monitor hear the Explorer, while he or another monitor feeds different Hemi-Sync signals directly to the subject. In the last tape he adds that body voltage, read through only two or three electrodes, told him most of what he wanted to know about the Explorer's state.
Guiding the Explorer through the states
A session began with the monitor taking the Explorer into Focus 10, on to Focus 12 and beyond, and asking for a description of the state. A common prompt in 1977 transcripts is to reach back, use the physical vocal cords and report what is perceived. A 1984 monitor asks an Explorer to go farther and farther out to the highest source of information and say when there. Monroe also improvised: when an Explorer could not stabilize in Focus 12, he asked for descriptions of levels 15 to 22 and back as he counted.
Relaying questions to the contact
When an Explorer met a nonphysical being, the monitor became the questioner. Monroe's own example is a monitor saying, ask him about gravity, then passing the answer back. On the first tape the prompts include asking what the beings' relationship to the Explorer is, what they can do to help the Explorer improve, whether they have a message and what name could be used to reach them again. Monroe likened Explorer and monitor to two brains working together.
Questions get reworded
In a 1984 session a monitor asked how life entered the physical universe. The communicator replied that the question contradicted the reality of creation, because life is creation rather than something that enters it. The monitor agreed the wording was an error and restated the question. The communicator later explained that on such basic ideas questions have to be redirected for the answer to make sense. Both sides were adjusting, which is why exact wording matters when reading a transcript.
Safety and comfort
The monitor watched the gauges as well as the conversation. Monroe describes sitting in the control room when an Explorer tried a new technique: within seconds every life-support reading dropped to nothing, and after about two and a half minutes he was on his way into the booth to try to resuscitate the body when the readings returned. Other sessions show smaller interventions: monitors add a grounding signal to help an Explorer return, and in one session the monitor told an Explorer who asked for someone to come in that staff would be right there.
Bringing the Explorer back
The return was as scripted as the descent. One monitor's closing instructions ask the Explorer to come back to the region of Focus 10 and take as much time as needed, then to return to ordinary waking consciousness feeling alert and full of energy, count down from 10 to one and accept a short beta signal to help. Later monitors ask whether the Explorer feels centered, offer a grounding signal and ask where the Explorer prefers the debrief.
Restraint and presence
A monitor's judgment included knowing when not to speak. After one session, a monitor explained that the Explorer was in a good flow and they had not wanted to interrupt it, even though other questions could have been asked. A communicator speaking through an Explorer gave monitors related advice: keep encouraging a new Explorer who feels nothing, treat silence as something to explore and suggest small movements of the arms, hands and toes. In another session a monitor said the resistance of new Explorers is projected onto the monitor.
Who held the role
On the original series the monitor is Monroe, and he describes the role in the first person. Rita Warren, who coordinated the Explorer work, and Martin Warren, who says he monitored many sessions, introduce later tapes and appear on them. Other staff ran the equipment and went into the booth to help Explorers out. Monroe said that attempts to monitor sessions at the Institute's center without full instrumentation were like flying an airplane blind.
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.
“She is wearing a modified set of headphones to give broad-frequency sound in each ear. Thus she can hear us and we can hear her. I or another monitor is sitting in a control room nearby, and we feed different types of audio hemispheric synchronization signals directly to the subject.”
“I waited. I watched. Not a single flicker came from the gauges. It was very, very tense for a moment, and then one minute passed, and then two minutes. In about 2 minutes and 30 seconds I got up and started to leave, thinking, well, I better get into the control—from the control room—and into the booth to see if I could do anything to resuscitate that body that should be there. I was up and on my way when suddenly all of the gauges came back to life and everything appeared normal. I sat back down again with a great sigh of relief.”
“Okay, excellent. Now take yourself farther and farther out to your highest source of information. Tell me when you're feeling yourself to be there.”
“In communicating about these very basic ideas, the questions have to be redirected in order to, for the answer to make sense.”
“Now, as you come back to ordinary waking consciousness, you will feel alert and full of energy. All your physical senses will be working brightly and beautifully. Physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, you'll be feeling in balance and in the state of harmony. Can you count yourself down now from 10 to one, and I'm going to give you a little beta signal to help you out.”
“You should try to make him experience, and not just let him lay there in silence, you see, because when he lays there he starts to wonder: Do I experience something? Am I an Explorer? Maybe these people out there get bored. Nothing is happening. The tones still seem to be the same. Maybe I should never have gone into the booth. You know, all these thoughts come [across] his mind. We've heard all of those. Yes. Now it is important that you stop the Explorer from getting close to those concepts by asking him to do certain exercises, by moving the arms, the hands, the toes. Get him involved in what was going on [in] the booth.”
“Thank you. This, this is very helpful in the case of working with what I call new Explorers. And this resistance occurs as you've described, and it is projected onto the monitor.”
“My, my thing in the session was that you were in all a really good flow. You were just going through all kinds of things. And so, I didn't want to really interrupt … and, and maybe stop the flow or, you know, throw a wrench in there.”
Important things to consider
Check the question before the answer
When an Explorer names a person, a place or an idea, look at the monitor's preceding line. A question like what do you notice invites a free report, while one that names a subject supplies a frame. A minute of context often changes what a statement means and shows which ideas the Explorer brought.
Sessions followed the Explorer, not a script
Monroe changed course mid-session when an Explorer could not stabilize, and later monitors followed what each Explorer's contacts asked for. Expect pauses, restarts and side trips. Counting, grounding signals and reminders in monitor lines were chosen for one Explorer in one session.
A lab standard, not a home method
Booth work had staff, instruments and someone ready to enter the room, and that is the standard to respect. The Gateway Experience and the Gateway Voyage are the Institute's structured routes to similar states, and the Voyage's CHEC units, controlled holistic environmental chambers, are the residential cousin of the lab booth.
Advice to monitors is reported communication
Several sessions include a communicator advising the monitors how to run sessions. Treat that as the contact's recommendation, as the Institute does for all Explorer material, rather than as lab protocol. The Institute takes no stand on its validity.
Monitor means different things elsewhere
In remote viewing, a monitor sits at a table with the viewer, supplies target coordinates and gives feedback. In the Institute's personal resource exploration sessions, a person in the booth has a monitor in the control room, as Explorers did. The word is the same, but the jobs differ.
Names on transcript lines
Raw transcripts label lines Monitor, Bob Monroe, a first name or nothing, and some mention staff by first name. A first name alone does not establish who monitored a session. This site uses roles and Explorer codes.
Machine transcripts blur speakers
Auto-generated transcripts often run the monitor's and the Explorer's words together, as in many 1970s sessions. When who said what matters, listen to the audio.
Common questions
What does the monitor do in an Explorer session?
The monitor sits in the control room, hears the Explorer through the microphone and speaks back through the headphones. The job has four parts: guiding the Explorer into Focus 10, Focus 12 and beyond; asking for descriptions and relaying questions to whatever the Explorer meets; feeding Hemi-Sync signals and adjusting sounds; and watching the gauges and the Explorer's comfort. At the end the monitor brings the Explorer back with a count, sometimes a signal, and a debrief.
Was Monroe always the monitor?
On the original Explorer Series tapes the monitor is Monroe, who introduces them in the first person and describes the monitor as himself or another staff member. Rita Warren, who coordinated the Explorer work, and Martin Warren, who says he monitored many sessions, introduce and appear on later tapes. Transcripts of other sessions label the monitor's lines Monitor, with a first name, or not at all, so a name on a line is not enough to say who ran a session.
What happened if an Explorer got into trouble in the booth?
The monitor watched the gauges and could send staff in. Monroe describes a session in which every life-support reading dropped to nothing for about two and a half minutes and he was heading into the booth when the readings returned. Smaller interventions appear too: monitors add a grounding signal to help an Explorer return, and in one session an Explorer who asked for someone to come in was told staff would be right there. The Explorer had a microphone close to the mouth and could speak to the control room.
How did the monitor bring an Explorer back?
By count and by voice. A typical closing asks the Explorer to come back to the region of Focus 10, take their time and let the monitor know when they arrive. The monitor then guides a return to ordinary waking consciousness, alert and full of energy, with a count from 10 to one and sometimes a short beta signal to help. Some monitors also offer a grounding signal, check that the Explorer feels centered and ask where the Explorer would like to hold the debrief.
Did the monitor's questions shape what Explorers said?
Often, and the transcripts show it. In one 1984 session a communicator told the monitor that a question about how life entered the universe was built on a false distinction, and the monitor restated it. The communicator said such basic ideas require questions to be redirected for the answer to make sense. A monitor may also hold back: one explained that the Explorer was in such a good flow that they chose not to risk stopping it. Reading what the monitor said just before an answer shows what the Explorer was responding to.
Do I need a monitor to explore consciousness myself?
Not for the Gateway Experience, which is self-guided: recorded narration and Hemi-Sync do the monitor's guiding. Explorer sessions were laboratory work with a monitor because the Explorer was talking to the control room, being measured and sometimes in contact with other beings. The Institute's lab still runs personal resource exploration sessions in the booth with a monitor in the control room, a Monroe Institute leader said on a 2017 podcast. A communicator in one 1985 session said progress without the equipment is possible.
Is an Explorer monitor the same as a remote viewing monitor?
The name is shared, the job is not. In Institute remote viewing training, as described in a 1984 procedures document, the viewer and monitor sit at opposite ends of a table in a plain room. The monitor gives the target coordinates, repeats them at intervals and gives feedback that reinforces the viewer's contact with the site without cuing the answer. An Explorer monitor works from another room, guides the Explorer's state, asks open questions and watches the instruments while the Explorer reports aloud.
In Monroe’s books
Summarized in our own words; the books are not reproduced on this site.
Far Journeys. Monroe pictures the monitor, himself or another staff member, in a control room down the hall, talking with the volunteer by sound system, feeding Hemi-Sync into the headphones to test new frequencies or help the volunteer reach a state, and watching the physiological readouts, often with an assistant.
Far Journeys. He adds a practical rule: volunteers visited the bathroom before each session, because too many sessions had been cut short when a full bladder was mistaken for a problem in the physical body.
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